Reviews posted below are in chronological order, not the order of enjoyment. At the end of the post, you’ll get to see my top fiction and non-fiction pick from this year. Enjoy – and let me know if you’ve read any of the same books I have!
4/5.
This book changed how I structured my life. I used to get up late-ish (7am or so – still a decently early time), but the Miracle Morning helped me push that to a comfortable 6am. More importantly, mastering my mornings has made me far more productive. Highly recomended.
5/5.
Great guide to using your body’s natural daily patterns to amplify your productivity, happiness, and wellbeing. Incredibly well-researched and written in a highly articulate way. Also changed how I structured my day.
Ancillary Justice (Imperial Radch #1)
2/5.
A huge amount of hype probably set my expectations too high. However, I found the story slightly lacking. I quite like slow, introspective sci-fi, but this often read like a less interesting version of The Left Hand of Darkness. I give it credit for a fairly interesting world and some cool commentary about the nature of empire, but it didn’t quite do it for me.
4/5
Subverted some common school-story / academy-story tropes in interesting ways I wasn’t expecting, and had super engaging action sequences that constantly upped the stakes. Interested to see where this series goes.
4.5/5
My previous experiences with Gaiman have not been fantastic. I’ve listened to a lot of his public lectures and essays on writing craft, and while I loved those, his only novel I’d read (‘Stardust’) failed to captivate me. This worried me a little, because so many authors I admire seem to look up to him – and like I said, based on his non-fiction writings and speakings, I had this idea of him being an incredibly high caliber author.
This book destroyed my disbelief.
Some books read like moutains: sprawling vistas that wow you with action or lush prose. This book was like a lake. Looked still and somewhat simple on the surface, but when you dove beneath the water, there was a delicious amount of complexity, intrigue, and resonating themes. The Graveyard Book is warm, and dark, and bittersweet all at the same time. I would’ve like to cry more at the ending chapter (I felt a little emotional, but not as teary as I felt the ending was wanting me to be), but overall this was an amazing read and the best fiction book I’ve read this year. Gaiman is as good as people say he is. I can’t wait to read more of his stuff!
Click here to listen to my Novel Analyst podcast episode on this book.
5/5.
I haven’t read many biographies, but if they’re all as good as this one, that might have to change. Vance created a fascinating insight into one of the most fascinating people alive today, and even if you disagree with some aspects of Musk, you can’t help but admire his drive and genuine desire to help humanity. I loved this and my respect for Musk has only grown.
5/5
Holiday has a fantastic, concise, amazing writing style. I found myself frantically highlighting huge passages on my kindle every few pages, which is less a testament to my note-taking abilities and more of a reflection of how good this book is. So many excellent theories (and practical, proven action steps) for creators wanting to adopt a long-term mindset with their craft. Excellent blend of inspiration with tactical advice. Lots of the book focuses on writing, which is excellent because that’s what I’m about. This is the first Holiday book I’ve written (after joining his email list a few weeks ago), but it won’t be the last.
3/5
Had a few great moments with big reversals and interesting character decisions, but the rest of the novel left a lot to be desire. I found it to be very slow-paced. Beyond the gimmiky in-world slang and the excellent scene where they subject the main character to anti-violence conditioning, it lacked depth. The ending, in particular, felt quite drawn out and the point it ended with felt underserved. Overall, there was too much padding for me. Would’ve worked better as a long short story or as a novella.
3.5/5
Having heard many of my favourite creatives rave about this book, I had high expectations going in. Given this it wasn’t suprising that it fell slightly below said expectations. Pressfield still crafted an engaging, blue-collar guide to writing, and it was refreshingly concise, but lacked a lot of tactical, actionable strategies beyond simply sitting down to ‘do the work’ (which, for the record, I enjoyed and found pleasing in its simplicity). Overall this is a good guide to writing, but I feel like it’s more targeted at someone who is wanting to write, rather than someone who’s been writing for several years.
3.5/5
Not quite as good as the first book in the series, and the plot felt meandering and directionless at times. However, there were several hilarious set-pieces, worldbuilding details, and scenes. My favourite would have to be the glasses which turn black if you encounter danger, thus protecting you from witnessing said danger. Highly practical.
4/5
Fascinating, compelling, and at times quite lyrical exploration of first contact between aliens and humanity – and how this changes society. There’s moments of fantastic, wonderfully poetic, spine-tingling prose in here. There were a few paragraphs I re-read several times just because I loved Clarke’s turn of phrase. What makes this novel even more remarkable is how fresh, original, and non-cliched it feels – even though it was published in the 1950s. Not bad. My one criticism would be the slightly slow beginning, but once you reach the second half of the book, the reveals come faster, the tension builds, and interesting things start happening…
4/5
Holiday’s one of my favourite non-fiction authors right now. He has this gift for providing an almost narrative-esque level of engagement and suspense to whatever he writes about. Perennial Seller is still my top Holiday book, but this book did something different (and possibly more momentous): it changed how I looked at the internet. As someone who’s grown up with explosive levels of technology change, it’s never something I’ve found confronting, or something I’ve unquestionably accepted, because I feel a level of literacy with it. This book showed how many things I hadn’t even known about the world of online news, blogging, and the internet. It essential shows how to generate massive publicity, turn fake stories into real history, and essential manipulate the internet for fame and fortune. At the same time, there’s a level of warning, regret, and advice on why you might not want to make this metaphorical deal with the devil. Overall, this book provides a good guideline for how to navigate the digital world of the 21st century (as a consumer and as a producer). It’s simultaneously liberating yet frightening and will improve your ability to critique, evaluate, and develop healthy scepticism about everything you consume – a useful skill that can be applied to everything. Great stuff!
5/5
I wish I hadn’t got this book from the library. I wish I’d bought it instead. Once again, Holiday has crafted an insightful, deeply resonant book with immense re-readability. It was about a third of the way through the book that I knew I’d have to buy a copy so I can take notes in it. Alas!
As someone who’s struggled with arrogance, this book was a fantastic antidote. There’s some phenomenal, practical exercises in here for curbing what Holiday rightly describes as our greatest opponenent: ego. His examples are diverse. Everyone from Presidents to greek heroes gets used to convey excellent ideas. Another home run from Holiday, who is fast becoming one of my favourite non-fiction authors. This book truly is his best.
5/5
Masterful characters, world building, and twists. Bardugo created an amazingly vivid, unique, and grim fantasy setting that felt incredibly realistic – and matched the story’s dark tone. What impressed me the most about this book, however, was the character moments. Juggling six point of view characters in one book is no mean feat, yet Burdugo gave each character a strong, unique voice, and each character had fantastic arcs. I must admit that while I liked book 1 of this duology, the cliffhanger ending left a bad taste in my mouth and felt a little cheap – but book 2 is well worth the pay-off. If you’ve read book 1 and have mixed thoughts about starting book 2, it is 100% worth your time. At the time of reading this, this was easily the best fiction book I’d read so far last year.
Click here to listen to the Novel Analyst episode I made about this book.
4.5/5
Phenomenal. Some of the issues are so-so, but when Gaiman is on his game, he’s on his game. My favorite comic within this omnibus edition (of about 20 issues) was the one regarding a man who is given immortality in the 1400s. Him and Morpheus, the eternal protagonist of the series, agree to meet in the same tavern every 100 years. It’s a wonderful high concept, and is explored in such beautiful detail by Gaiman – all within the space of a single issue (less than 30 pages, I think). Artwork was amazing! I can’t wait to read the next few volumes, and see what’s in store for the Lord of Dreams…
3.5/5
BIG is one of my favorite architecture firms. For all their funky building shapes and sometimes wacky designs, they’re unapologetically people-centered and back their decisions with extensive research, testing, and empathy. This book is a great insight into their process. My favorite part of this archicomic was seeing how few of their projects actually got built, because it’s an honesty, authentic insight into how difficult the creative life is, even for massive entities like BIG. Highly recommended.
2/5
Did not enjoy at all. Dry, boring, and dull – the real story doesn’t even start until over halfway through the book. If you like time-wasting setting descriptions (or ‘exciting’ events like 3 pages of characters complaining the train’s dining cart is full – which leads to no pay off) then you’ll like this. I don’t like that kind of stuff. So I didn’t like this.
I think for me the biggest demonstration of this novel’s flaw was the scene where they have the first bull fight. The entire novel is built up towards this moment. And then … it’s over in three sentences of unemotional, detached description. Meh.
Other flaws include a main character with zero agency, no interesting traits, and no interesting choices. Unlike, say, The Great Gatsby (which I love), I don’t understand how this is described as a classic.
5/5
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People is the best self-development book I’ve read. Unlike some other books on similar topics, what makes this book stand out for me is the focus on integrity and building a strong internal character – rather than focusing on surface-level social manipulation techniques. As the author says, positive change comes from the inside to the outside.
Here are the 7 Habits:
1. Be proactive – the level of your success is related to how you deal with the gap between stimulus and response. Proactive people may not always be able to choose their stimulus, but they realise that they can always choose their response.
2. Begin with the end in mind – this applies to everything from focusing on output (not input) to considering your legacy. I love this habit’s focus on integrity and principles.
3. Put first things first – make sure that your actions align with your values. Walk the talk.
4. Think win-win – always consider how you can give value to others, and how your interactions with others can improve both of your lives (not just yours). Embrace the Abundance Mentality by realising that in most situations, there is enough for everyone to win.
5. Seek first to understand, then to be understood – have an open mind, embrace empathy, and truly listen to others. Avoid being someone who’s either talking or waiting to talk. Instead, truly seek to understand others without judgement or without projecting your experiences onto them.
6. Synergise – interdependence is a higher value than independence. Synergy is the result of a cohesive team who follows the aforementioned habits. With synergy, 1+1 = 3.
7. Sharpen the saw – embrace a growth mindset. Seek continual education. Ensure you are constantly renewing the Physical (exercise, nutrition, stress management), Social/Emotional (Service, empathy, synergy, intrinsic security), Spiritual (Value clarification & commitment, study, meditation), and Mental (Reading, visualizing, planning, writing).
4.5/5
Superb! A wonderful, imaginative mash-up of architecture and science fiction, philosophy and pop-culture, whismy and logic. Full of amazing essays on architectural theories, but unlike most
theory books, this is written in an engaging, relevant, entertaining way – while still going deep. I wish Geoff could have been a teacher at my uni!
4/5
I adored this book. Gaiman pulled another amazing feat and managed to make a relatively slow-paced, meandering novel feel engaging, thought-provoking, and interesting. I particularly loved the character of Shadow. He felt highly sympathetic and fully three-dimensional. It’s easy to imagine him living before or after the story’s events. Overall, this is a great read for people who enjoyed nuanced fantasy concerned with questions of identity, truth, and the self.
3.5/5
Somewhat slow middle, with a lot of pointless filler, but built back to a triumphant ending that made me lift the book’s rating. It jumps around a lot of timelines, which I found confusing – simply adding a date/year to the start of the flashback chapters would have helped a lot and improved their impact. The main character was alright, but not particularly complex enough to sustain my interest. Probably why it took me over a month to read this. I will say I had high expectations, having heard Ryan was an excellent author, and on balance this book does a lot right. Still undecided if I want to read the next installment – but if this book didn’t have the last 50 pages, I definitely wouldn’t, so take that as an indicator of its quality.
5/5
Excellent creative writing advice. As a massive fan of McKee’s ‘Story’ (which I often refer to on the Novel Analyst podcast), I had high expectations. Happily, they were exceeded. There’s so many gems in this book, including some wonderfully concise summaries of story theories. I’d buy this book just for those.
Here’s the three most useful things it taught me:
1) The key to good dialogue is subtext. Avoid on-the-nose writing by avoiding literal expression of subtext (true intent) in the text (surface-level action/talk)
2) Dialogue is action. Characters use dialogue to pursue their desires.
3) The MAGIC IF: if I were my character in this situation, what would I say?
4/5
I love brevity. I also love fantasy. Historically, these things don’t play well together. Fat, doorstopper-sized tomes are the norm in fantasy, and while I love big epics, it’s nice to read shorter pieces, too.
A Reaper of Stone by Mark Gelineau and Joe King is a fantastic (free!) fantasy tale that packs an amazing story into a short novella. Within the space of a hundred-ish pages, the authors build an amazing world, create interesting characters, and craft an engaging plot. Even despite my love of big fat fantasy books, it’s refreshing to read something short and sweet. This novella essentially condenses the best aspects of epic fantasy into a pint-sized package.
Overall, A Reaper of Stone is a fantastic story for anyone looking for a short, fast-paced, unique fantasy read. Highly recommended.
4.5/5
To me, this series is an old, comfortable sweater – in the best way possible. Let me explain. Out of the many middle-grade/YA books I read as a kid (Harry Potter, CHERUB, Rangers Apprentice, etc.), Skulduggery Pleasant is the only series that continues to this day. That’s special. By the time I opened this book – number 12 in the series – Landy had the weight of 11 previous (amazing) novels to draw from. And how he drew from them …
There’s so many excellent twists and fantastic world building in this. You’d expect that. It is a bestselling YA fantasy novel, after all. What you might not expect is the level and depth of characterisation. By the time this book begins, readers understand the protagonists are not purely good people – but out of all the SKP books, this one tugs at that string in an exquisite manner.
My only criticism was that the ending felt slightly weak, with the final conflict resolved more easily than expected. However, a large part of that was due to the first half being fantastic. Almost the complete reverse of the previous book, where the second half was insanely better than the first.
All together, this was another amazing book by one of my favourite authors. Can’t wait to see where the next book goes!
4.5/5
So close to a perfect fantasy read! If you enjoyed the previous book in the series, this one delivers an even stronger plot, and arguably more character development. For those not familiar with the Lightbringer series, it’s set in a gritty fantasy world with a unique magic system, where ‘Drafters’ can extract colour from the world and use it to create objects.
If you know me well, you’ll know that gritty fantasy + cool magic system = happy Jed.
And this book certainly made me happy :).
As with the previous entry in the series, the strongest points were the fast-paced plot. There was an AMAZING twist around 3/5ths through the book that made me delighted. I read a lot, so I can be a little jaded sometimes. This twist, however, ripped through me. It was a joy.
Two negatives (slight, compared to the otherwise awesome nature of this book). One: the prose quality was lacking and at times tested my suspension of disbelief – I didn’t think some characters would use the words the author used.
And two: the ending. Overall, I like the direction it established for book three. However, it felt like the complications arose from nowhere. The foreshadow was – at best – tenuous.
Ultimately, though, I really enjoyed this book. It’s a solid 4.5 out of 5, and I’d highly recommend it to fans of Brandon Sanderson.
4.5/5
First Godin book I’ve read, and it won’t be the last. Linchpin is a proactive plea to give more of ourselves to the world. Godin’s thesis revolves around the idea that separate from the Mangers and the Workers is a third class – the Linchpins. Linchpins make Art. Seth defines this is ‘a generous gift that changes the status quo for the better’ – which is an excellent way to think about writing a story, greeting a customer, or creating an amazing service. I particularly love his focus on the importance of EQ in a world that can over-value stats. Highly recommended for anyone who wants more fulfillment from their life!
4/5
Fantastic, wild, whimsical supernatural thriller. Plenty of wacky humour that appealed to me, meshed in with a gripping plot and good levels of suspense. My only critique was that the second half didn’t quite match the build up created by the first, but overal it was very enjoyable. So enjoyable that – having to rush to the airport before I could finish – I photographed the last 30 pages and finished reading the book on my phone.
Bias note: I met Daniel O’Malley at a conference, and I was lucky enough to chat to him and get him to sign my copy.
3/5
I went in with high expectations. Many authors I admire raved about this series, and while there were certainly moments I enjoyed, the story felt too straightforward for my tastes. I kept waiting for the big moment when the plot kicks into gear or when we get some deep, profound insight into the main character – who is a cyborg with a love for tacky TV serials. While there was some nuance to the cyborg’s characters, to me they lacked agency and interest until near the end of the novella. Overall, it’s a solid, well-constructed read but nothing exceptional.
4/5
Like with many Abercrombie novels, it starts perhaps a little slow, but once you reach the middle it’s clear you’re witnessing a master author. Thorn (the book’s main character) is a girl desperate to become a great warrior – and she might be one of my favourite Abercrombie characters (Curnden Craw, Glotka, and Logen are the other contenders). There’s so many wonderful nuances to her that Abercrombie explores … and that’s just one of the majestic characters in this novel. My main reason for loving Abercrombie is his trueness. Sure, he writes fantasy. But people behave like real people, and the world feels so three-dimensional. This book is true fantasy at it’s best. My main criticism would be a slightly abrupt ending that feels quite intended to set up a third book, but apart from that this is a wonderful grimdark fantasy novel for anyone who wants to explore an amazing world – or, at least, half of it …
4.5/5
An excellent writing craft book by a literary agent who knows his stuff.
Whether you’re a plotter or pantser, ever writer wants to craft stories that make readers feel. This book teaches you how. I’ve read a lot of writing craft books, but there were many new concepts Maass introduced that blew my mind. Here’s the key lessons I learnt from this:
1. Emotions have more impact when they’re surprising – when someone dies, it’s logical for their loved one to be sad. It’s surprising (and thus more emotionally impactful) if they have a secondary, surprising emotion, such as guilt that they couldn’t be buried in their preferred grave, or anger that now they’ll never finish that argument.
2. Focus on the specifics – we’ve seen hundreds of characters cry. We probably haven’t seen many characters that, while crying, think about the fact that they’ll never have their dead friend there to make weird comments about birds on the weekly walks they used to take together. Specificity = emotional realism and impact.
3. Highest tension comes as a result of us hoping for an outcome we think unrealistic – if this outcome occurs, we’ll feel immense catharsis.
4/5
I initially picked this up because it was a similar size/format to my upcoming fantasy book, and I wanted to see how it was laid out (basically an extreme judge-a-book-by-its-cover thing) – and then I saw the Neil Gaiman quote on the cover. I love Neil, so I decided to actually read the thing. And I’m glad I did.
Simple on the surface, but complex underneath, this is a story about a woman who’s father is dying. It’s not a quick death, or an easy one, but one that takes a long, long time. And this gives ample opportunity to explore their relationship, and the relationship of the woman with her siblings. There’s an enchanting quality about this that elevates the story to a deeper level. I was also a big fan of how the author used specificity to increase the emotional impact of what could have become a bland, archetypal story. Overall, it’s a great short read that packs a sense of gravity.
3/5
‘When the Cold Breathes’ is a sword and sorcery fantasy novel, about a warrior who must protect a town from an attack by wights. It’s heavy on the action and the sword fighting, and if you enjoy classic, pulpish fantasy, you’ll enjoy this. Personally, I prefer fresher, more unique fantasy, so I found some of the tropes quite well-worn. Nothing about the book surprised me in a particularly new way. If anything, the world felt a little like a Dungeons and Dragon campaign. I’m a big DnD player, so this isn’t super derogatory, but it does reflect the lack of freshness. I also was a bit discomforted by the lack of any real female characters. Mentioning ‘women’ as a collective was the closest this gender got to being included.
So, overall, while the book didn’t strike a cord with me, you would probably enjoy it if you’re after a plot-heavy, action-focused, pulp-style fantasy read. I should also mention that this is the first Ragnar book I’ve read, so perhaps my criticisms about one-dimensional character development would be different if I’d read previous books in the series.
Disclaimer: I received a free review copy from the author, who promised to read and review my book as well (except he didn’t, which left a bad taste in my mouth) but all opinions in my review are my own.
3/5
A fairly focused discussion about how identity is a construct, and often does more harm than good. While Grant has some good points, I didn’t feel like I learned anything particularly new. If also felt like the majority of this book was quoting/referencing other books, which weakened it a bit. Would’ve felt stronger for me if he focused more on his own experiences – the sections where he did focus on his own experiences were quite strong.
4.5/5
Perhaps the most perfect novella I’ve ever read. Sure, I’m biased, because Sanderson is my favourite author at the moment. Even then, I’ve read novellas of his that didn’t amaze me (like Emperor’s Soul) – but this was something special. It’s a simple premise, of a simulated city reconstructed so detectives can investigate past crimes. While I was afraid of it becoming a reheated version of Source Code, Inception, or The Matrix, it carved out a unique identity and flavour within the cyberpunk simulation-world sub-genre. And that ending … WOW. Even though I was expecting a big twist, Sanderson took it in a direction I didn’t expect – but that made perfect sense. Highly recommended for anyone wanting a 2-3 hour quick read.
4/5
Brandon Sanderson’s books often get standing ovations for the ending. While the climax of this novella didn’t disappoint, I was pleasantly surprised with the middle. Leeds, – the main character – has an interesting condition where he has several hallucinatory people (aspects, as he calls them) who follow him around, giving advice on matters that these people are experts in. He’s the only one who can see them. Don’t worry, he’s perfectly sane. But some of his aspects aren’t.
For instance, Leeds has aspects who are experts in guns, then other aspects who are experts in languages, and between these advisers, Leeds is basically a one-man army. I loved Sanderson’s exploration of these different aspects, and how they impacted Leeds’ psychology. This novella is a quick read (I finished it in one sitting) and I’m looking towards the next installment. Bravo, Mr Sanderson!
4.5 / 5.
Perhaps the best world building I’ve seen in a fantasy novel read this year! The city of Guerdon feels incredibly real, with layers of history, conflicting cultures, and shadowy plots aplenty. Reading this book reminded me of London. Like England’s capital, Guerdon is a place where you feel the weight of the past. It was such a cool feeling to experience this realism in a fantasy book. Not because fantasy authors are bad at world building (in fact, they’re usually experts) – but more because it’s rare to see a city characterised so strongly. The only thing holding me back from a 5 star rating is the ending. It works, but it feels quite abrupt and a little bit deus-ex-machina. Overall, though, a great book brimming with fantastic ideas. If you enjoy monsters, magic, and well-developed settings, this novel will delight you.
I analysed the book in this Novel Analyst episode,
and I interviewed the author in this episode.
4/5
Magic cowboys. Do you need any more reasons to love this?
Following 300 years after the original Mistborn trilogy (which is one of my top 3 fantasy series of all time), I was a little worried about Sanderson not living up to the magic of the previous books. Fortunately, I was pleasantly surprised. No, this book doesn’t quite reach the heights of the OG trilogy, but it’s a different beast, with a tighter, faster-paced plot – a wise choice from Sanderson. It sits comfortably separate, with a unique identity, and that made it an easy book to enjoy. Some of the reveals were a little weak, but overall it’s a fresh and interested steampunk-esque fantasy book – looking forward to reading the next Wax and Wayne book!
5/5
Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less sets out an ethos focusing on how to keep the main thing the main thing. A difficult goal, but as McKeown eloquently sets out – a valuable one. A hugely valuable self-development book with critical relevance for our over-distracted digital age.
5/5
Staggering. I was biased going in, since Sanderson is my current favourite author – and, once again, he delivered. There’s a scene at the end where a character reminisces about the tricky balance between art and expectations. If your expectations are too high, it’s difficult for art to clear that bar and impress the audience … but that’s exactly what Sanderson did.
There were multiple times in this book that brought me chills. Genuine, smile-widening, hairs-on-neck-raising chills. It’s incredibly special to experience a moment like that in a story. It’s something extraordinary to experience multiple moments within the one book.
At 400 000+ words (about 1100 pages), I was surprised to finish this in about 10 days. To put that into context, it took over a month to finish book 1 of this series, The Way of Kings. Part of that speed was because of holidays (long road trips = awesome reading time). But the bigger part was because I just couldn’t put this done. A masterful novel but a masterful author. Probably my favourite Sanderson novel I’ve read so far.
Listen to my podcast episode analysing how this book gives readers the chills.
4/5
For a genre where the focus is often on the ideas, the tech, and the world, this sci-fi novel was refreshing for its focus on the characters. Even against the background of solar-system-wide conflict, it was the characters that drew me in. Not quite at the level of a Dune or a Confusion of Princes, but it’s a fantastic sci-fi read that includes a thick layer of truthful humans … literally (you’ll know what I mean if you read it).
Thanks to Jules for recommending it!
4.5/5
I felt like Ray was speaking just to me. So many things he said made me feel like he’d seen into my soul, and he’d pulled out everything, put it back together, then slotted it back into me, better than before. This is a truly special book. Bradbury (author of the amazing Fahrenheit 451) tackles the subject of storytelling with enthusiasm and empathy. Essential reading (and re-reading) for writers who want to make extraordinary stories. I picked up a library copy, but I will definitely be considering buying a copy to own. My only minor critique is that the essays in the second half don’t have quite the same impact as the first half ones, but this is always the issue with anthologies. Overall – bravo!
5/5
As a fantasy author, I love reading history and thinking, ‘this is so much more ridiculous than anything I could put in a story!’. There were many of those moments with Ghost Empire, an historical 1000-year voyage through Constantinople, beautifully wrapped in the framing device of a father and son trip to modern day Istanbul, as the city is now known. This is a goldmine of ideas worth stealing for a story. This is one of the first full-blown history books I’ve read, but it won’t be the last.
4.5/5
I’m a big fan of Holiday, and this book about the importance of stillness within a busy modern world was a fantastic read. Stillness can be a solitary walk along a beach, meditating, or playing sport – anything where you are completely immersed in meaningful moments without distraction.
At first, the short bite-sized chapters annoyed me a bit (because it felt very ‘blog-post-y’). However, by the end of the book I realized they were perfect. In particular, they’ll make it easy to re-read portions in the future. Concise, actionable, and without massive amounts of padding out thanks to stories and anecdotes. Speaking of anecdotes, this book was plenty of fascinating case studies that made me want to read a whole lot more books about a whole lot more Still people. Here’s my big 3 takeaways:
1. “As a well-spent day brings a happy sleep, so a well-employed life brings a happy death.” – Leonardo da Vinci
2. “Take something you care about deeply, a possession you cherish, a person you love, or an experience that meant a lot to you. Now take that feeling […] and consider how every single person, even murderers on death row, even the jerk who just shoved you in the supermarket, has that same feeling about something in their lives.” – this practice is called mitfreude (the opposite of schadenfreude)
3. “It is impossible to live the pleasant life without also living sensibly, nobly, and justly, and conversely it is impossible to live sensibly, nobly, and justly without living pleasantly.” – Epicurus
4.5/5
Recommended to me by fantasy author Gareth Hanrahan (when I interviewed him for my podcast), this is a polemic on productivity and the merit of doing less – but doing it better. I’d like to think that I’m quite good at focusing, (I did write a Time Management book a while ago, after all), but I still learned a ton of useful lessons from this. More importantly, Deep Work isn’t a dry instruction manual. It’s a lively, engaging, and passionate glorification of the creative process. For anyone wanting more focus, productivity, and meaning to your work – read this book.
My biggest takeaway was the idea of the the 4 Disciplines of Execution (comes from Clayton Christensen, by Newport gets credit for his wonderful explanation):
1. Focus on the widely important – this intense focus on 1-2 key elements crowds out the noise and stops you wasting time trying to figure out how to block all the 100 other distractions. I like to call it the ‘sink or swim’ approach to crossing a river – rather than worrying about how to build a perfect boat.
2. Act on Lead Measures – focus on your input into a project, since measurements from the result usually come too late to be useful. In writing, I do this by focusing on hitting certain thresholds/word counts/time spent writing each day.
3. Keep a compelling scoreboard – what gets measured gets managed.
4. Create a cadence of accountability – my friend and I have gone on weekly walks for almost a year and it’s hugely boosted my accountability, productivity, and happiness.
5/5
(Note: I listened to the audiobook). I’ve read Manson before (he has an excellent personal development blog), but the popularity of this book made me reticent for a few years. I’m happy to say it exceeds the hype. Probably the biggest takeaway was his exploration of death:
“Death is the shadow by which we see the light of life.” – Mark Manson
I’ve always been a big fan of Memento Mori (the constant self-reminding power of remembering your mortality), and this book developed my understanding of this painful but ultimately helpful belief. While contemplating your death may sound depressing, I’ve always found it gives me more vigor to embrace life.
What Manson has achieved is quite monumental. Through a fairly click-baity title, and through his conversational, humorous style, he’s helped hundreds of thousands (or probably millions) of people get exposed to some of the most critical tenants of philosophy. I’d put this up there with Man’s Search for Meaning, and The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Highly recommended.
4.5/5
An amazing, surprisingly poignant fantasy novel about a rag-tag group who overcome their differences to attempt an impossible heist. This book does the wonderful trick of presenting you with characters who seem like standard fantasy stereotypes – then over the course of (800+) pages, it peels back their layers and exposes more complexity and nuance than you would expect. It felt a little slow in the middle at times, but once it started thundering towards the conclusion, the last 300-400 pages soared.
And the ending is so beautiful, sweet, and fitting, that it made me tear up. I’m not a big crier, and it’s been a long time since a book made me cry, so this was a wonderful experience.
If you want more of my thoughts on this, I made a podcast analysing the first 48 pages in fine-toothed detail. I must’ve been onto something, because the author retweeted a link to the show!
4.5/5
Hugely helpful book with great strategies and tactics for authors looking to build their email list. For me, here were the biggest takeaways:
1. “Your list is not for selling books. Your list is for selling yourself. Your list is for building superfans—and superfans, by definition, will buy your books.”
2. Aim for each email to get reads to open it, click inside it, and respond to a question. This ‘holy triad’ is key to improving delivery rates and creating a better fan experience.
3. Show your uniqueness in your emails – again, you’re selling you. But be authentic!
I’m really wanting to up my email game, as I now have the fortune of having a mailing list of 300+ readers. Looking forward to using this book to make my emails even better for my fans.
5/5
Just stunning. I’ve never read fan-fiction before, but if they’re all as good as this, that might have to change a lot … Here’s the premise: Harry Potter, but if Harry was scientifically trained and had an off-the-charts IQ. Basically, it’s a story about Harry trying to figure out how magic works – and then ruthlessly exploiting all the loopholes for his benefit. (For example, when he discovers owls always find their target even if the sender doesn’t know where they are, he realises you could strap a hand grenade to an owl and tell it to find Voldemort … hypothetically speaking, of course – that’s not a spoiler.)
To give you an idea of this book’s success: according to the author it has received over 5 million hits and was once the #1 most-reviewed Harry Potter fanfiction on the entire Internet, and was once the second Google result for “rationality”. Yup, it’s big.
“Petunia Evans married a biochemist, and Harry Potter grew up in a house filled to the brim with books, reading science and science fiction. Then came the Hogwarts letter, introducing strange new opportunities to exploit. And new friends, like Hermione Granger, and Draco Malfoy, and Professor Quirrell…”
What’s remarkable about this story was how addictive it was. 600 000 words (4 times as long as The Order of the Phoenix) blew by in under 3 weeks. That’s insanely fast for me. Besides the obvious excitement of seeing a re-imagined version of a story I love, this book is a masterclass in making readers want to keep reading (which is ultimately the goal of any author). What created this feeling was two masterful elements:
– Agency
– Suspense
Agency: Harry is so proactive in how he drives the story forward. His boundless curiosity is infectious to readers and made me stay up late to see what magical loophole he would try exploiting next.
Suspense: there’s a lot of questions, both on the macro level (will Harry use magic to solve death, etc.) and the micro (who’s putting notes under Harry’s bed; how will he escape from this problem). Perhaps this is a (welcome) result of this story originally being written as a serial. You have to make sure readers come back next week, and a good way to achieve that is to make them have unanswered questions.
Overall, this was an incredible experience. It’s been a huge part of my life for the last 3 weeks and I’m a little sad it’s over, but so so grateful for the read. It’s a book about rationality, curiosity, the scientific method, and love – and I know it’s principles have made me a better person and will help me a lot in life (it’s by a super-savy AI researcher who coined the term ‘friendly AI’, and in many ways it’s an exploration of his philosophy: the Methods of Rationality). Big thanks to Tom S. for the recommendation!
4/5
A compelling tale about Annev, a crippled boy in a fantasy world where disfigurement means persecution, out of the belief that cripples are servants of a dark god. Hiding his missing hand with aid of a magical prosthetic, Annev is part of a wonderfully imagined magic school. His dream: complete the tests ahead of him and become a magic-hunting avatar.
Comparisons to Hogwarts are to be expected with this premise. However, the author clearly creates a highly unique school-story setting, building both the characters and the world through hugely entertaining training exercises. Almost everyone in this story feels complex and realistic. These characters feel like they have their own lives outside the story, and that’s really to the book’s benefit.
My main criticism is that the plot-related events of the last half of the book feel a tad disjointed from the first half. That’s not to say they’re bad, per se. However, it did feel like the first 50% was all ‘school story, school story, training exercise, training exercise’, and then the tone and direction changed somewhat in the last 50%. My other big criticism was that this book is advertised as the origin story of a villain, fated to become evil. Until the last few pages, I didn’t really get that vibe. Even then, if I wasn’t aware of this marketing premise, I probably wouldn’t know that this is what the series is about. I would’ve personally appreciated more early foreshadowing of Annev’s supposed descent to the dark side.
Overall, though, I really enjoyed this book. While the plotting is a little episodic for my tastes, the characters and the fantastically realised world building shine. I’ll certainly be looking out for sequels.
Bias note: I’ve talked with the author several times on twitter prior to purchasing this book. However, all comments are my own.
My Favourite Books of the Year:
Non-fiction:
5/5
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People is the best self-development book I’ve read. Unlike some other books on similar topics, what makes this book stand out for me is the focus on integrity and building a strong internal character – rather than focusing on surface-level social manipulation techniques. As the author says, positive change comes from the inside to the outside.
Here are the 7 Habits:
1. Be proactive – the level of your success is related to how you deal with the gap between stimulus and response. Proactive people may not always be able to choose their stimulus, but they realise that they can always choose their response.
2. Begin with the end in mind – this applies to everything from focusing on output (not input) to considering your legacy. I love this habit’s focus on integrity and principles.
3. Put first things first – make sure that your actions align with your values. Walk the talk.
4. Think win-win – always consider how you can give value to others, and how your interactions with others can improve both of your lives (not just yours). Embrace the Abundance Mentality by realising that in most situations, there is enough for everyone to win.
5. Seek first to understand, then to be understood – have an open mind, embrace empathy, and truly listen to others. Avoid being someone who’s either talking or waiting to talk. Instead, truly seek to understand others without judgement or without projecting your experiences onto them.
6. Synergise – interdependence is a higher value than independence. Synergy is the result of a cohesive team who follows the aforementioned habits. With synergy, 1+1 = 3.
7. Sharpen the saw – embrace a growth mindset. Seek continual education. Ensure you are constantly renewing the Physical (exercise, nutrition, stress management), Social/Emotional (Service, empathy, synergy, intrinsic security), Spiritual (Value clarification & commitment, study, meditation), and Mental (Reading, visualizing, planning, writing).
Fiction:
5/5
Staggering. I was biased going in, since Sanderson is my current favourite author – and, once again, he delivered. There’s a scene at the end where a character reminisces about the tricky balance between art and expectations. If your expectations are too high, it’s difficult for art to clear that bar and impress the audience … but that’s exactly what Sanderson did.
There were multiple times in this book that brought me chills. Genuine, smile-widening, hairs-on-neck-raising chills. It’s incredibly special to experience a moment like that in a story. It’s something extraordinary to experience multiple moments within the one book.
At 400 000+ words (about 1100 pages), I was surprised to finish this in about 10 days. To put that into context, it took over a month to finish book 1 of this series, The Way of Kings. Part of that speed was because of holidays (long road trips = awesome reading time). But the bigger part was because I just couldn’t put this done. A masterful novel but a masterful author. Probably my favourite Sanderson novel I’ve read so far.
Listen to my podcast episode analysing how this book gives readers the chills.
Closing Thoughts:
I read 49 books this year, 11 less than the 60 I read in 2018. However, I enjoyed my books more, because I hadn’t set a definitive reading goal to read X number of books. Not having a numbers-based goal meant I wasn’t daunted by big books, which led to some of the best reading experiences I’ve ever had.
So, for this year, my goal is the same: not to measure my reading based on the quantity of books consumed, but rather by the quality of books read.
Every month, I send out an email containing reviews of each book I read that month. If you’d like to get these emails, you can sign up here (And as a bonus, you’ll get a free story from me when you sign up):
