My Reading Log
Here's where I keep track of all the books I have been reading lately. This is mostly for my own personal benefit so that I don't forget what I have read.
| Title | Author | Rating | Review |
|---|---|---|---|
| 21 Lessons for the 21st Century | Yuval Noah Harari | 4/10 | Apparently everything is going to kill us. There are a handful of insights among the doom and gloom, but mostly this is a… more |
| A Clash of Kings | George R. R. Martin | 9/10 | Not quite as gripping as the first book in the series, but Martin maintains much of the same level of quality throughout this… more |
| A Dance with Dragons | George R. R. Martin | 9/10 | I was late to the whole A Game of Thrones thang (but, for the record, I was like totally in to this waaayy before the… more |
| A Feast for Crows | George R. R. Martin | 6/10 | After the first three rousing volumes of the Song of Fire and Ice series, this book is a huge disappointment. I get… more |
| A Game of Thrones | George R. R. Martin | 10/10 | After finishing The Name of the Wind, I wanted to continue my fantasy novel kick. A Game of Thrones is a… more |
| A History Of Wood Engraving | Albert Garrett | 6/10 | The title of this one is a bit deceptive. The book is actually a history of British wood engraving. It starts out at… more |
| A Renegade History of the United States | Thaddeus Russell | 6/10 | The premise here is that the outsiders and the misfits, by rejecting puritanism and pushing the limits of what is acceptable,… more |
| A Storm of Swords | George R. R. Martin | 10/10 | I had thought that this was the conclusion of the entire Song of Fire and Ice series, but aparently this is book three… more |
| Admiral Hornblower in the West Indies | C. S. Forrester | 6/10 | I was disappointed when I came to the realization that this was more of a collection of short stories rather than a full novel… more |
| Against Empathy: The Case for Rational Compassion | Paul Bloom | 7/10 | I think it's telling that throughout this book the author in constantly having to backtrack and clarify what he means by … more |
| Aliens Omnibus | Various Authors | 4/10 | This is a collection of the Aliens comics that were released by Dark Horse in the late eighties. These came out before… more |
| And Then There Were None | Agatha Christie | 10/10 | Great page turner. |
| Anthem | Ayn Rand | 5/10 | Having read her other books, I felt obliged to read this novella. It's a fairly literal take on individualism that would have… more |
| Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder | Nassim Nicholas Taleb | 8/10 | Another big book about risk from Taleb filled with math, anecdotes, history and Fat Tony. This time it's all in service of his… more |
| Baby Shark | Robert Fate | 10/10 | I really liked this noir-ish crime novel set in the dingy pool halls of rural Texas. Lots of great characters and a Kill… more |
| Baby Shark's Beaumont Blue's | Robert Fate | 10/10 | The second Baby Shark story is just as brutal and action packed as the first with great characters and writing. |
| Baby Shark's Grass Widow Legacy | Robert Fate | 10/10 | Another thoroughly enjoyable book in this series. This time Kristen is told to take some time off from all the revenge killing… more |
| Baby Shark's High Plains Redemption | Robert Fate | 10/10 | I love these Baby Shark books. They are just great, action packed reads. I burned through this book in a few days and… more |
| Baby Shark's Jugglers at the Border | Robert Fate | 9/10 | Although I don't think it's hardly the best book in this series, I burned through this one in just a few days. These Baby… more |
| Baby Shark's Showdown at Chigger Flats | Robert Fate | 9/10 | Another enjoyable story filled with shooting, kicking and revenge. This story is much more straightforward than others in the… more |
| Bad Penny | John D. Brown | 7/10 | I enjoyed his fantasy series, so I thought I'd try out Brown's crime thriller series. This is the story of an ex-military/ex-… more |
| Barbarella | Jean-Claude Forest | 7/10 | The French comic upon which the movie was based. Stunning 60's stylized artwork, but the story is just a series of bland sci-fi… more |
| Based on a True Story | Norm MacDonald | 8/10 | He starts off with a typical comedian's memoir and, after about three pages, Norm gives up and go total autofiction. There's a… more |
| Basic Economics: A Common Sense Guide to the Economy | Thomas Sowell | 6/10 | Not bad, but I was expecting a more basic econ textbook rather than, what more often than not, feels like a purely political… more |
| Before They Are Hanged | Joe Abercrombie | 8/10 | Although I was disappointed by The Blade Itself, I decided to continue on with the series to see if all that plodding… more |
| Black Hole | Charles Burns | 7/10 | Decent and weird graphic novel. Lots on indy comic cliche. |
| Black Rednecks & White Liberals | Thomas Sowell | 8/10 | A collection of six lengthy essays on race, history and misconceptions. The "Black Rednecks" essay is probably the most… more |
| Blue at the Mizzen | Patrick O'Brian | 7/10 | Not the strongest book in the series. It doesn't help that many of the regular characters are gone in this book. |
| Bullies: How the Left's Culture of Fear and Intimidation Silences Americans | Ben Shapiro | 4/10 | I generally like the various Ben Shapiro "Destroys" videos I come across on the webs. He is an excellent debater and can take… more |
| Caliban's War | James S. A. Corey | 7/10 | This the second book in The Expanse series. It felt like a bit of a retread but with less interesting characters. The… more |
| Cat Among the Pigeons | Agatha Christie | 6/10 | |
| Catcher in the Rye | J.D. Salinger | 6/10 | More of a character study of a completely unappealing character than a plot-driven novel. Not my thing. |
| Commodore Hornblower | C. S. Forrester | 6/10 | A disappointing follow-up to the last Hornblower novel. This one has Hornblower in Russia helping out during the siege of Riga… more |
| Connecticut Privateer Samuel Smedley | Jackson Kuhl | 7/10 | A short book about a lesser known hero of the American revolution. As the captain of a Connecticut privateer vessel, Smedley… more |
| Coolidge | Amity Shlaes | 6/10 | This was a fawning look at Coolidge's life and tenure as the 30th President. It was okay up to a point, but there's something… more |
| Curse: The Dark God Book 2 | John D. Brown | 7/10 | Despite an exciting opening, the second book in this series is not as good as the first. The stakes aren't as high and it feels… more |
| Dance of Death: A Graphic Commentary on the Danse Macabre Through the Centuries | Fritz Eichenberg | 8/10 | Filled with art featuring death (for the most part that means a skeleton... spooky, no?) taunting the living. The reproductions… more |
| Dear Reader: The Unauthorized Autobiography of Kim Jong Il | Michael Malice | 9/10 | I have read quite a few books that give an account of what it is like to live under the control of a totalitarian regime, from… more |
| Desolation Island | Patrick O'Brian | 9/10 | The books keep getting better. |
| Devil Born Without Horns | Michael A. Lucas | 9/10 | Michael Lucas is best known as the schtick-loving bassist of The Phantom Surfers. This book was self-published under his own… more |
| Discrimination and Disparities | Thomas Sowell | 7/10 | Sowell is always an interesting read. However, I find that he can be a bit repetitive in his points from book to book’I get it… more |
| Don't Cry For Me | William Campbell Gault | 8/10 | I recently discovered Prologue Books’a publisher devoted to re-releasing old pulp novels in ebook form. This is a company that… more |
| Eccentric Orbits: The Iridium Story | John Bloom | 9/10 | Eccentric Orbits is the history of the rise, fall, and eventual rebirth of the world's first (and only) global… more |
| Economics in One Lesson | Henry Hazlitt | 9/10 | A straightforward and methodical look at the economic principal of accounting for both the seen, and unseen effects of a given… more |
| Empire of Lies | Andrew Klaven | 7/10 | I like Andrew Klaven. His Klaven on the Culture videos are good natured and entertaining little bits of political… more |
| Equal Rites | Terry Pratchett | 9/10 | The third Discworld novel starts a completely new storyline with no crossover with the first two books. I actually liked this… more |
| Evidence of Love: A True Story of Passion and Death in the Suburbs | John Bloom & Jim Atkinson | 8/10 | Outside of Helter Skelter, I have not read much true crime literature. I picked this one mainly because is was co-… more |
| Falling Up the Stairs | James Lileks | 7/10 | I know Lileks mostly as a humorous conservative commentator and a connoisseur of cheesy 50's pop culture. I wasn't sure what to… more |
| Financial Fiasco | Johan Norberg | 7/10 | This book presents a history of the current financial crisis thingy in a way that tries to be as plain-spoken as possible. Some… more |
| Flying Colours | C.S. Forester | 9/10 | Another great Hornblower tale. The action picks up right at the end of the previous book and keeps going all the way to the… more |
| Food: A Love Story | Jim Gaffigan | 7/10 | An entertaining read that pretty much says everything funny that can be said about food. I've read a couple of these books by… more |
| Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets | Nassim Nicholas Taleb | 8/10 | I've heard a few interviews with Taleb and he can be very interesting so I tried to give one of his books a try knowing that… more |
| Foundation | Isaac Asimov | 4/10 | I was bored silly by this classic sci-fi book. I wanted to like it. It's voted as the greatest sci-fi series of all time. I'm… more |
| Friday | Robert A. Heinlein | 4/10 | Even as an audio book, this was a chore to get through. It's a tale of a future with super human artificial persons (the… more |
| Gods' Man: A Novel in Woodcuts | Lynd Ward | 8/10 | Beautiful wood engravings are the reason to "read" this. |
| Groucho And Me | Groucho Marx | 5/10 | This autobiography was pretty uninformative. Reads more like a compilation of unrelated essays about with a little bit of… more |
| H.M.S. Surprise | Patrick O'Brian | 6/10 | Weakest of the first 3 Aubry Maturin books. |
| Happy Endings | Jim Norton | 6/10 | Norton is usually a very entertaining guest on whatever chat show on which he appears. However, I've watched his stand-up and… more |
| Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows | J. K. Rowling | 10/10 | A satisfying ending to a wonderful series of books. The rating reflects my opinion of the series more than that of this one… more |
| Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince | J. K. Rowling | 10/10 | |
| Haunted | Chuck Palahniuk | 3/10 | Starts out with some amusing short stories but never amounts to much. The main plot line is barely existent and the stories are… more |
| Heart of Darkness | Joseph Conrad | 5/10 | I read this mostly because I am an admirer of Apocalypse Now. It sorta lost me by the end so I really didn't enjoy… more |
| How Adam Smith Can Change Your Life: An Unexpected Guide to Human Nature and Happiness | Russ Roberts | 8/10 | In this book Roberts (of EconTalk fame) takes Adam Smith's other major work, The Theory of Moral … more |
| How to Piss in Public: From Teenage Rebellion to the Hangover of Adulthood | Gavin McInnes | 9/10 | When I started this book I was apprehensive. As much as I love Gavin's current incarnation as a wild libertarian/conservative… more |
| How We Decide | Jonah Lehrer | 7/10 | I am not usually a non-fiction reader outside of the occasional political tome, but I bought this after it was recommended by… more |
| I Am Jackie Chan | Jackie Chan | 5/10 | Mildly amusing but poorly written memoir. |
| In Fifty Years We'll All Be Chicks | Adam Carolla | 8/10 | I decided to try this one out on a whim. I like Adam Carolla and his humor translated pretty well into book form (although I… more |
| In the First Circle | Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn | 8/10 | Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn brings us more thrilling tales from the gulag! This is his fictionalized account of life in the Marfino… more |
| Kill All Normies | Angela Nagle | 7/10 | This is a pretty good overview of the roots of (mostly) right-wing Internet subcultures and trolls with a little fair-and-… more |
| King Jesus: A Novel | Robert Graves | 4/10 | I loved "I, Claudius" but was utterly bored by this. Maybe I would have appreciated more if I had more than a passing knowledge… more |
| Last Argument of Kings | Joe Abercrombie | 7/10 | The final book of the First Law trilogy was a sort of step backwards from the previous book. In the previous book I grew to… more |
| Let's Tell a Story Together | Jimmy Maher | 8/10 | I'm a regular reader of Jimmy Maher's blog The Digital Antiquarian which documents the history of the early days of… more |
| Leviathan Wakes | James S. A. Corey | 8/10 | I've been watching The Expanse lately and wanted to get a taste of the novels that the show is based upon. This was a… more |
| Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning | Jonah Goldberg | 8/10 | The thesis here is that, despite the constant cries of "fascism" when talking about right-wing policies, the real heirs of… more |
| Liberalism | Ludwig von Mises | 6/10 | Short overview of the basics of classical liberalism with nary a reference to praxeology. |
| Lord Hornblower | C. S. Forrester | 7/10 | Starts out nicely with Hornblower sent off to deal with a mutinous crew and keeps up the pace for about half of the book.… more |
| Lovers and Madmen | Barry Devlin | 7/10 | Above average 50's pulp trash. See my Bent Pages recap. |
| Marxism | Thomas Sowell | 4/10 | I got this as an audiobook, hoping to get a decent overview of what Marxism is without having to actually read Marx himself.… more |
| Mistborn: The Final Empire | Brandon Sanderson | 9/10 | My post-Game of Thrones decent into pure phantasy nerdom continues with the Mistborn trilogy. This first book in the… more |
| Mort | Terry Pratchett | 8/10 | So, I'm now four books into the Discworld series and I think I will keep going with it (only 33 more to go). Mort… more |
| Motherless Brooklyn | Jonathan Lethem | 10/10 | It has been a while since I've read a contemporary novel that I liked this much. Motherless Brooklyn is a pretty… more |
| Mysteries of the Unknown: Ancient Wisdom and Secret Sects | Time-Life Books | 8/10 | The chapters on Free Masonry and The Golden Dawn were pretty informative. I think my big takeaway about these sects was not so… more |
| Mysteries of the Unknown: Mysterious Creatures | Time-Life Books | 7/10 | The first chapter about sea creatures is probably the best part of this book. Lots of great illustrations of ships being… more |
| Mysteries of the Unknown: Phantom Encounters | Time Life Books | 4/10 | This book is a collection of anecdotal tales of various people from the olden days being visited by spirits. The stories go as… more |
| Mysteries of the Unknown: Transformations | Time-Life Books | 8/10 | Transformations is divided into three main sections: native American shapeshifters, werewolves and vampires. The… more |
| Mysteries of the Unknown: Witches and Witchcraft | Time Life Books | 9/10 | I enjoyed this one a lot more than Phantom Encounters. The historical accounts are more fact-based rather than… more |
| Mysterious Stranger | David Blaine | 5/10 | Some interesting magic history, a few neat tricks and lots of David Blaine's self-hating magic style-endurance artist crap. |
| No Holds Barred | Barry Devlin | 6/10 | The ridiculous plot of this pulp trash novel is as follows: disgraced big city reporter winds up in small town; proves his… more |
| No, They Can't: Why Government Fails-But Individuals Succeed | John Stossel | 9/10 | John Stossel is awesome. I've been a fan ever since I was in the seventh grade and watched him debunk pro wrestling and, in the… more |
| Not Cool: The Hipster Elite and Their War on You | Greg Gutfeld | 8/10 | Another enjoyable read from Red Eye host Greg Gutfeld. The thesis as I see it is that liberals own the definition of cool… more |
| Old Man's War | John Scalzi | 7/10 | This is a science fiction tale based on the premise that, sometime in the distant future, our planetary defense army would be… more |
| On the Far Side of the World | Patrick O'Brian | 8/10 | Another nice entry in the Aubry Maturin series. |
| Orphans of the Sky | Robert A. Heinlein | 5/10 | Another old sci-fi novel by Heinlein that cares more about the concept than the story. Even at 120 some pages, it still felt… more |
| Passenger to Frankfurt | Agatha Christie | 4/10 | The first third is intriguing then it just jumps ship. |
| Peril at End House | Agatha Christie | 8/10 | |
| Pictures of the Socialistic Future | Eugene Richter | 7/10 | An incredibly prescient book from the 19th century that basically lays out everything that is wrong with the practical… more |
| Presto! How I Made Over 100 Pounds Disappear and Other Magical Tales | Penn Jillette | 7/10 | Penn details his weight-loss journey and his wacky diet. It's an interesting take on how we view food and there are elements of… more |
| Prey: The Drovers, Book 1 | John D. Brown | 7/10 | Looks like I am ending the year on a YA fiction kick. Prey is the story of a young boy (aren't they all) who takes a… more |
| Prisoner's Base | Rex Stout | 7/10 | Decent mystery. A nice change of pace from A. Christie. |
| Progress: Ten Reasons to Look Forward to the Future | Johan Norberg | 8/10 | Johan Norberg wrote one of the clearest accounts of the 2007 financial meltdown and, after that dismal tale, he's back with a… more |