2021 50 Book Challenge

[Numbernine]

Yeah, it was good. I think it could've been 200+ pages longer, but that might just be me... I like Heller's work, and have been slowly finishing off the ones I haven't read yet.

What's the best one to start with.

 

[Fueco]

What's the best one to start with.

Usually I’d say start with the earliest one and go through them. My first of his books was Kook, about him learning to surf in his 50s. The River was really good as well. I’m currently reading Whale Warriors, about a trip with the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society to stop a whaling expedition off Antartcica.

 

[lwmarti]

The latest: Washington: A Life, by Ron Chernow. An interesting overview of the life of a man whose decisions really ended up changing the world.

Spurious accusations of collusion with foreign governments! People unwilling to be part of the Administration because of how they would be treated by the press! Trump? No! Washington's second term!

This one was well worth the time. I'm trying to get through Hamilton, by the same author, and it's tough. Just not as interesting, etc.

 

[Fueco]

16. The Whale Warriors: The Battle At The Bottom Of The World To Save The Planets Largest Mammals, by Peter Heller

A journalist embeds on The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society’s ship Farley Mowatt as they head into the Southern Ocean just off Antarctica to attempt to stop a Japanese whaler from killing whales in violation of international treaties.

This is a fascinating look at what goes on behind the scenes in such actions. It was also a fitting companion to the Netflix documentary Seaspiracy, which I watched the other night.

 

[Geoffrey Firmin]

16. The Whale Warriors: The Battle At The Bottom Of The World To Save The Planets Largest Mammals, by Peter Heller

A journalist embeds on The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society’s ship Farley Mowatt as they head into the Southern Ocean just off Antarctica to attempt to stop a Japanese whaler from killing whales in violation of international treaties.

This is a fascinating look at what goes on behind the scenes in such actions. It was also a fitting companion to the Netflix documentary Seaspiracy, which I watched the other night.

Have to took the documentary up sound interesting.

 

[Fueco]

Have to took the documentary up sound interesting.

The book goes into a lot more detail, but the documentary gives a really good overview on the whaling issue and delves into other things as well. If you like seafood, it’ll be a tough one to watch.

 

[Fueco]

17. Smokejumper: A Memoir By One Of America’s Most Select Airborne Firefighters, by Jason A. Ramos

Part memoir of Ramos’ career as a wildland firefighter, part history of wildland firefighting, and part “how can we make this job safer and allow firefighters to be more effective at fighting fires”.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, but then I studied this stuff in college, so really no surprises. I do still regret not pushing harder to get a job with CalFire back in the late 1990s.

 

[LonerMatt]

Spoiler: List

1. Death's End
2. Piranesi
3. Living Sea of Waking Dreams
4. Uncanny Valley
5. War of Maps
6. A Constellation of Vital phenomena
7. The New Wilderness
8. Attack Surface
9. Gods of Jade and Shadow
10. The Galaxy and the Ground Within
11. Gallowglass
12. Cultural Warlords
13. A Song for A New Day
14. The Secret Life of Addie LaRue
15. Terra Nullius
16. Fall of Koli
17. A Desolation called Peace

17. A Desolation called Peace

**** yeah the boys. Great book, sophmore book that is as up to par to the first one. If you know, you know. If you don't it's a sick read with a lot going on. Loved it.

 

[Geoffrey Firmin]

18.Where The Bird Sing Best by Alejandro Jodorowsky

What a long strange trip its been.

A fabulist cavalcade of Russian and Polish Jewish families whose destiny it is to produce the author. Programs, the invention of the Tarot, mystical lion tamers, Parisian con men, ocean voyages to Chile & Argentina. Generations of art, suffering, communism, a wandering mendicant, a ghostly Rabbi, workers of the world unite against the slavery of capital only to be mowed by capitalism slaves the military at the bequest of the bourgeoise mercantile class. Theatre and circus events, the most outlandish sex scenes I’ve ever encountered, directed transmigration of the soul culminating in the authors miraculous birth.

Jodorowsky has over his artistic career produced both film and literature, this is the first book of his I’ve read although I am more familiar with the surrealist cinema of El Topo and The Holy Mountain.

 

[PhilKenSebben]

I have a bunch. I haven't read in weeks, and then I was able to read 5 books in 4 days. Feels so good

*4. Ship of the line - Diane Carey - sttng novel set after generations and before first contact. Brings back captain morgan baeston who was played by kelsey grammer. The biggest issue of this was trying to read it and translate it into the actor of kelsey grammer. Good read though. Fun one to revisit

5.in the ocean of night - gregory benford - a science fiction book written in the 1970s and Set in the far off distant years of......1999-2018...... Fun read. Dragged a bit at blpatts. An alien craft appears, some relics are found on the moon, religious fanatics do religious fanatic things. Humans transcending their views. Was a good read!

6. Search the sky- frederick pohl and c.m. kornbluth - more 70s scifi, but placed much more distant I to the future. Humanity colonized many other worlds who gradually lost contact and each experienced their own genetic and societal decay. Guy goes around in a FTL ship to gather genetic material to begin to solve the problems. Bit......sexist, racist, and mysoginistic. There is a spanking scene where he wishes he had a hairbrush. The story is good, could be updated a bit

*7. Masks - john vornholt- fun sttng novel. #7 in the series, so it is a bit older, but fun plot of a planet that list technology but was founded my a troupe of actors it is kind of like middle ages meets shakespeare. Fun quick novel. Picard gets laid

8. A world beneath the sands - toby wilkinson - really well written story and history of colonial archaeology and interests in egypt dating back to the 1700s. Detailed without being dry, accurate without being technical. He is one of my favorite authors, and I would encourage you to pick it up if you have any I terest in the subject

9. Imbalance - v.e. mitchell - a neat sttng novel set 6 months after the episode "data's day", the crew revisits the jarada, the insectoid species from the episode "the big good bye" where picard has to do a weird greeting ritual. Funny. Anyway, this is a follow up to that, there is some action, and the plot wraps up WAY too fast at the end. In like 5 pages. There eis a chemical imbalance in the I section species and the enterprise cures it. Nothing to write home about, but a solid read for.a rainy day

 

[Fueco]

18. First Steps: How Walking Upright Made Us Human, by Jeremy DeSilva

A look at how and why we walk the way we do and how that helped shape behavior of modern humans.

 

[Geoffrey Firmin]

18. First Steps: How Walking Upright Made Us Human, by Jeremy DeSilva

A look at how and why we walk the way we do and how that helped shape behavior of modern humans.

I remember a philosophy lecture in second year at university speaking about the reasons we stood up was it increased our visual acuity and it was cooler as it allowed air to better circulate around the body on the savannah.

 

[Fueco]

I remember a philosophy lecture in second year at university speaking about the reasons we stood up was it increased our visual acuity and it was cooler as it allowed air to better circulate around the body on the savannah.

There are quite a few hypotheses about why we became bipedal and that’s one of the more prominent ones.

 

[Geoffrey Firmin]

19.First Person Singular by Haruki Murakami

Don’t believe the hype. Or maybe the subtlety so subtle I missed it.

 

[Fueco]

19. Lie Machines: How To Save Democracy from Troll Armies, Deceitful Robots, Junk News Operations, and Political Operatives, by Philip N Howard