Ask HN: What books are you currently reading? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: What books are you currently reading?

11 pointsdebt43 comments

I'm curious what books everyone is currently reading. What books are you currently reading?

I just finished Ready Player One, it was a great read, super interesting story, If you like the 80s and Arcade Games it's a must read.

I second this!

Ready Player One is a super fun read and they are making it into a movie too!

http://readyplayeronemovie.com/

Read this last week. There were lots of individual things I disliked about the book, yet still thoroughly enjoyed it as a whole. Quite a fun story

I just finished this myself. If you're geeky, and in the 18-40 age range, I highly recommend this book.

I'm reading this now!

As expected there's lot of nonfiction readers here. Does anyone else find that they get more out of fiction than nonfiction? There's a lot to learn from putting yourself in a character's shoes, seeing life through their eyes and witnessing their life unfold.

I'm currently reading 'Steppenwolf' by Hermann Hesse, and 'Of Human Bondage' by Somerset Maugham. Both novels are fictional representations of the author's life.

I agree with you ! I'm currently reading "Siddhartha" by Hesse and I finished reading "The Name of the Rose" by Eco about a week ago !

Not sure if getting more, but nonfiction reading is quite strenuous for me, as I try to retain as much information as I can. On the other hand, I read fiction for the experience, so even if I forgot everything I read after turning the page, it would be no problem.

Pimp: Story Of My Life written by Iceberg Slim. Learned about it from the latest Chappelle standup special. Very dark and fascinating tale of a pimp in the 1940's. A lot of cold, calculating capitalist ideas abound in it.

Also just started Astrobiology: A Short Introduction which was recommended by a fellow HNer.

I just finished reading Oathbringer by Brandon Sanderson. It is the third book in the Stormlight Archive series. It was a fantastic read and the entire series is totally epic. Sanderson has many different trilogies, novels, and short stories in a universe he calls The Cosmere. If you like fantasy and haven't read any Sanderson, you should definitely check his stuff out!

https://brandonsanderson.com/books/the-stormlight-archive/oa...

Looking forward to this myself, but don't want to rush in because of the expected gap until the next volume is published.

So I'm re-reading the first two books again before I start it.

(I have a shelf full of Brandon's work - even the young-adult books!)

* Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig - for some reason I never read this before although I've known about it for years. Enjoying it so far.

* How I Became Free in an Unfree World by Harry Browne - I read this years ago, but decided to re-read on a whim and it's surprising how relevant it still is.

The Secret of Our Success: How Culture Is Driving Human Evolution, Domesticating Our Species, and Making Us Smarter https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25761655-the-secret-of-o...

THE LIFE AND ADVENTURES OF ROBINSON CRUSOE

https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/daniel-defoe/the-life-and-...

https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/33942804-phillip-rhode...

Bronze Gods by A.A. Aguirre https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15808271-bronze-gods

https://www.amazon.com/Computer-Science-Distilled-Computatio...

I'm currently reading "The four hour chef" by Tim Ferris. It's amazingly interesting, as it doesn't only cover cooking but also language learning and other skills. Great book!

I am suffering trough, Red Mars, Green Mars and Blue Mars (currently reading)

I found this series more rewarding than almost any other book series. I find it to be so.... literarily... satisfying. I have no idea how to explain that. The author's vision of the future is so complex and compelling, and the humanity of it all. I could go on for hours!

We agree to disagree on this one :-)

For me one series I feel like you do, is the Asian Saga by James Clavell, maybe because I read the books for the first time as a child and have always been interested in business, etc, but like you I cannot explain it :-)

I will certainly check it out! Isn't it strange what kinda reaches out and gives you a big impression? I'm interested in your opinion once you've finished.

I am always glad to hear of books that leave this kind of impact on people, and I've heard about the Asia Saga before, but I forgot about it. Very eager to start. Thanks for the recommendation

I would recommend the following books I have read last year and really liked the ideas behind:

"The Road Not Taken" is a short story by Harry Turtledove

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Road_Not_Taken_(short_stor...

Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy by Liu Cixin

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remembrance_of_Earth%27s_Past

And this one is autobiographical by one of the smartest men of our time: A Man For All Markets by Edward O. Thorp

http://www.edwardothorp.com/books/a-man-for-all-markets/

Nothing right now, but have two unfinished books in my backlog. First is Spring Snow by Yukio Mishima and the other is Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software.

Just finished in the last week:

- What a wonderful world by Marcus Chown

- 47 Ronin by Joan D. Vinge

- Practical Monitoring by Mike Julian

Currently reading:

- The Four by Scott Galloway

- The Art of Capacity Planning 2nd Edition by Arun Kejariwal, John Allspaw

Seeing Like a State by James C. Scott, Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami, 2666 by Roberto Bolaño, and the Haskell Book.

- Go tell it on the mountain by James Baldwin

- The doors of perception by Aldous Huxley

- The Patriarch (Joseph Kennedy biography) by David Nasaw

- Surely you're joking, Mr. Feynman by RPF.

- The book of secrets by Osho.

- Big Data Baseball by T. Sawchik.

- The Intelligent Investor by B. Graham.

Right now I'm reading Zen Guitar to rethink how I play guitar, and The Color of Magic for fun.

Every january since 3 years ago I reread Antifragile by Nassim Taleb. I always find new ideas in it.

I am reading Shoe Dog, the memoir of Phil Knight

It is a pretty amazing store of how he started Nike

Robert Louis Stevenson essays (again) GK Chesterton Orthodoxy (again)

JPOD from Douglas Coupland. I like it much more than Microserfs :-)

Quantum Computing since Democritus, by Scott Aaronson

and

The City and The City, by China Mieville

Last 4

Snow Falling on Cedars Color of Law Artemis Evicted (starting tomorrow)

Reclaiming Conversation: The Power of Talk in a Digital Age

Pragmatic Thinking & Learning - Andy Hunt

Art & Fear by David Bayles and Ted Orland

Sell or Be Sold by Grant Cardone

Have you read Grant's other books? So far I've read Sell or Be Sold, The 10x Rule, If You're Not First, You're Last and Be Obsessed or be Average. I've found all of them to be pretty good. Not necessarily life changing, but solid, with a good mix of motivational message and some actionable ideas. Enough so that I'll probably go back through and read a couple of those again and actually take notes this time through.

I have not, I would really like to thou. Thanks for the feedback on the other books. I am going to move to the 10x rule next.

The Godfather

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