What are you reading these days?

I have a couple:

My non-fiction book is Why We're Getting Poorer by Cahal Moran. It's an economics book that investigates the root of systemic inequality in the world and how we can improve it.

He's the person behind the Unlearning Economics YouTube channel and I really like how he discusses nuanced, complex topics without the intimidating jargon that non-economists won't be familiar with, while also humanising it with personality and humour.

My fiction book is going to be Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree. I read the prequel, Bookshops & Bonedust, earlier this year not knowing it was a prequel and I enjoyed it so much I wrote to him to express my joy.

I've just finished Orwell's 1984 and Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 before that so I need something cosy to even the balance.

I'm reading Glorious Exploits by Ferdia Lennon. It's about two friends in ancient Syracuse who decide to put on a performance of Medea with captured starving Athena soldiers playing all the parts. I'm only about halfway through but so far it has been the funniest books I've read in a while.

Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro. I’ve read Never Let Me Go by him which was great but very sad. Klara and the Sun deals with similar themes of love and meaning of soul, but has a different tone (albeit still a sad undercurrent). Very humanist, lighter science fiction isn’t usually my cup of tea, but he does a great job keeping it interesting. I’m gripped by it and the small worldbuilding mysteries he sprinkled in; I’m worried it’s winding up for bigger tragedy, but who knows! I only have 100 pages left.

It’s certainly a good palette cleanser of a book on my Sanderson completionist quest. Next I’ll likely be reading Mistborn Era 2, but maybe I’ll finish the year with one more novel(la) before embarking on that series. Dune and Circe have both been on my list for a long time, so we’ll see if I have the motivation to finally pick them up before the year runs out.

So I almost entirely listen to audiobooks due to my ADHD, but I consider it reading most of the time.

I've been enthralled with the Dungeon Crawler Carl series lately, I'm on book 4 The Gate of the Feral Gods. Absolutely enthralled. I don't think I've ever been into a book as much as this. I'm coming home and listening to this book instead of turning on the TV or computer lately.

I am actually worried by how quickly I'm going through it though because I'm having such a blast and it's so unique.

This year I've already read(listened to) all the Bobiverse books, Project Hail Mary, and the Murderbot Diaries, and I fear I'm running out of these kinds of immersive types of books.

A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James —pretty good book so far. I think it all leads to an assignation attempt on Bob Marley. I don’t really know much about the politics of Jamaica during the 60s and 70s.

I'm reading (listening to) Mark Solm's Hidden Spring, on the recommendation of a TikToker I like, @ post.capitalist.pedagogy. For the last few years, I've been at a dead-end in how to further my understanding of the world. Having landed firmly in the Determinist and Adaptionist camp as far as free will and consciousness go, I've hard a time finding a pragmatic and interesting next step, so to speak. Hidden Spring is helping me out of it. He's constructing a science of the brain and mind that includes the subjective experience. He goes through the history of neuroscience, psychoanalysis, behaviorism, et al. to explain how science has come to the point it has, and puts forward a framework, neuropsychoanalysis, as a way to better understand consciousness and its contents. So far, I'm digging it, but parts of it are going to take a second and third listen so I can understand it better and know how to apply it to my own philosophy.

I'm also super pumped that I'm finally seeing English translations of Byung-Chul Han's works in audiobook format being made available. He's a philosopher I've been interested in a while, introduced to me by a podcast I like called Philosophize This. I've started Agony of Eros, but I decided I needed to pause it until I have a chance to rewatch von Trier's Melancholia. I didn't realize it would be referenced so heavily. Thankfully, no one in my library system seem to be fighting me for access to Han's work.

I just finished listening to Daphne Du Maurier's 'My Cousin Rachel' (Published 1951). Good old Gothic Fiction! I was introduced to Du Maurier through her novel Rebecca which is a masterpiece of Gothic Fiction, a riveting page turner with an ending that can never be forgotten. Highly recommended reading for anyone, this is not stinky old literature.

My Cousin Rachel is definitely not the quality of Rebecca, but it is still a very good book. A young man (Philip Ashley) coming of age is living with his Cousin Ambrose Ashley, Ambrose goes off to Italy and ends up married to a mysterious woman named Rachel. Ambrose then dies of mysterious causes but is able to get a cryptic letter off to Philip with accusations of poisoning, but things are not clear. What is clear is that Ambrose left a new will giving everything that was going to be Philips to Rachel but never signs it, why? Rachel then comes to see Philip back home and stay with him, Philip is wary of her but she is very charming and wins him over, in fact he falls in love with her. Philip then decides to 'right' Ambroses 'wrong' by gifting her the entire estate upon his 25th birthday when he rightfully inherits the estate. After this Rachel starts acting more and more mysteriously, is she playing games with him or is he reading into her actions too much? Philip falls seriously ill and eventually also suspects he is being poisoned, clues are found but that is it. The book comes to a head when he is finally determined to find out the truth, an unfortunate accident occurs and Philip is left to find the truth himself. I won't ruin the end but it is great. A totally unexpected ending where no actual twist occurs, the whole thing comes down to the last couple paragraphs. Masterfully done.