Chapter a Day?
I had an idea for a service that lets you read a book via email. Like, it sends you a chapter a day. But, maybe you're busy one day and you don't have time to read the whole thing, only reading 1/2. Well each paragraph would have a "stop here" link. And tomorrow's email would pick up there.
Truth is, I don't know if I'd use a service like this. I find it hard to imagine that I would read something, but maybe having it delivered in chunks would make it more likely. No idea. But I found the idea for being able to mark where you stop interesting.
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My To-Be-Reads
I literally partake in Tsundoku with my ereader, adding far more books than I consume. But doing so brings me immense joy to see my virtual library and know that there is always a large variety of books available for me when I'm ready. Above is a look at the most recently added books to my ereader.
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Revising my 2024 Reading Goal
Coming into 2024 I resolved to read more books. I do read, and probably more than the majority of people, but nowhere near as much as I want to. I enjoy reading. But it is a constant battle against the Internet. So, making it a priority for this year is a thing I want to do.
I came in with the ambitious goal of reading 50 books this year, however I realized that this doesn't incentivize me the way I want. I've come to enjoy reading a lot more once I realized I can stop reading books when they stop being enjoyable or being worth the effort. And by making my goal 50 books, that pushes me not to quit books and thus makes picking up a book to read much more important.
First was "Our Oldest Companions" by Pat Shipman, which is a book looking at the history of humans and dogs. An interesting read, but I found it plodding at points and ultimately fell off. I had thought the book would be much more behavioral, and it does touch on that, but it is very focused on the transition point of wolves to dogs, and that as it turns out is not as interesting for me.
Second was a fiction novel which I'll admit I picked off of BookTok. "People from my Neighborhood" by Hiromi Kawakami. The pitch didn't reveal the true nature of the book, which I am glad for, despite it not being my cup of tea.
So, given that I'm in the third week of the year and I have abandoned two books already, it's clear that I need to change.
The current goal means I have to pick books which are ones I "have" to finish. And that isn't feasible. I need fluidity and flexibility.
Given this, I'm revising my goal. Rather than books, my goal is pages. If I arbitrarily set an average book length of 300 pages, then that translates 50 books into 15,000 pages this year. I tracked how far I got into each of the abandoned books, as well as the book I already finished. And it puts me at around 525 pages so far this year, which is a little behind pace for what I need for 15,000 pages. But is directionally where I want to be and so I feel good about it.
I've since finally dipped my toe in to Terry Pratchett's Discworld as I'm now reading Guards! Guards! and quite enjoying it. Additionally, I am working through an an audiobook called Scarcity Brain by Michael Easter. It's definitely infotainment, but I've taken a few interesting tidbits away from it. I'm glad I'm taking it as an audiobook, I think if I had read it as a book I would have bounced off at a few portions.
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52 Books in 2024
I don't normally do book challenges, but I decided this morning I am going to attempt to read 52 books in 2024. I have so many unread books. BookTok is so bad for my stack of epubs waiting to be read. And I don't currently prioritize reading, really, until I get into bed. Before that moment, I much prefer to keep my laptop in my lap.
So, for 2024 - I am going to attempt to tackle a book a week. We'll see how it goes.
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Uhhh, I just looked and saw I've added 105 ebooks to my library and kindle THIS year. By my count I've read 11 of them.
I'm never going to catch up at this rate!
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What I'm Reading - Aug. 1
Just Finished
Daily Rituals: How Artists Work by Mason Curreyy - Bite sized entries of varying size and depth about many famous artists and people of all sorts. It's infotainment. There were no real major insights or realizations, but it was interesting and fun to read.
Currently Consuming
Sleeper Agent: The Atomic Spy in America Who Got Away by Ann Hagedorn - Still early into it, but it's interesting and providing context to the era, the Cold War, and the cultures in their respective countries.
This “historical page-turner of the highest order” (The Wall Street Journal) tells the chilling story of an American-born Soviet spy in the atom bomb project in World War II, perfect for fans of The Americans.
George Koval was born in Iowa. In 1932, his parents, Russian Jews who had emigrated because of anti-Semitism, decided to return home to live out their socialist ideals. George, who was as committed to socialism as they were, went with them. There, he was recruited by the Soviet Army as a spy and returned to the US in 1940. A gifted science student, he enrolled at Columbia University, where he knew scientists soon to join the Manhattan Project, America’s atom bomb program. After being drafted into the US Army, George used his scientific background and connections to secure an assignment at a site where plutonium and uranium were produced to fuel the atom bomb. There, and later in a second top-secret location, he had full access to all facilities, and he passed highly sensitive information to Moscow.
Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence by Ann Lembke - Listening to this audiobook. Came to it after hearing her interview on Tim Ferriss' podcast. I've got the audiobook checked out and need to get back to listening to it.
This book is about pleasure. It’s also about pain. Most important, it’s about how to find the delicate balance between the two, and why now more than ever finding balance is essential. We’re living in a time of unprecedented access to high-reward, high-dopamine stimuli: drugs, food, news, gambling, shopping, gaming, texting, sexting, Facebooking, Instagramming, YouTubing, tweeting....
The increased numbers, variety, and potency is staggering. The smartphone is the modern-day hypodermic needle, delivering digital dopamine 24/7 for a wired generation. As such we’ve all become vulnerable to compulsive overconsumption.
Think Like a Rocket Scientist by Ozan Varol - Another Audiobook I have checked out from the library, just started it on the drive home this evening as I wasn't in the mood for Dopamine Nation. Still in the intro but enjoying it.
A former rocket scientist reveals the habits, ideas, and strategies that will empower you to turn the seemingly impossible into the possible.
Rocket science is often celebrated as the ultimate triumph of technology. But it's not. Rather, it's the apex of a certain thought process -- a way to imagine the unimaginable and solve the unsolvable. It's the same thought process that enabled Neil Armstrong to take his giant leap for mankind, that allows spacecraft to travel millions of miles through outer space and land on a precise spot, and that brings us closer to colonizing other planets.
Fortunately, you don't have to be a rocket scientist to think like one.
Next Up
Checkmate in Berlin by Giles Milton - Picked it up based on the read of the book cover, haven't delved in at all.
In Queen Esther's Garden by Vera Basch Moreen (translator) - This line from the book cover caught my interest: "An anthology of Judeo-Persian literature." -- It's far outside my comfort zone and something I'm excited to dive into.
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Spoilers: Bionic Reading had no measurable impact
tl;dr. Actually no, the results will probably not surprise you. After analyzing data from 2,074 testers, we found no evidence that Bionic Reading has any positive effect on reading speed. In fact, participants read 2.6 words per minute slower on average with Bionic Reading than without. That said, the difference here is so small (less than 1%), that the real takeaway is Bionic Reading has no impact on reading speed.
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SendToPod.com - Service takes articles and turns them into a podcast for you
Came across it on Reddit. I signed up but haven't tested it yet. Might be an interesting part of the content pipeline from my Wallabag into this service. We will see how it does.
It's in beta right now, so for July there's no limits on usage, but it will be a Freemium service starting in August it seems.
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Embracing the content queue
I consume a lot of content. Articles, tweets, videos, podcasts, books, etc. As you might have noticed, I have recently dove back into queuing of content, that is utilizing systems designed to allow me to capture interested content for consumption at a later point. Specifically, this is in regards to podcasts, articles and YouTube. The value here is to be better able to capture interesting content as they come across my feed, but also that it improves the quality of what I consume by basically giving me a two pass approach at filtering the content.
The first filter is a measure of immediacy and my mental prioritization of the content. If I don't consume some content immediately upon seeing it, then that says the content failed it's initial test. This content is either not interesting enough for me to prioritize it over whatever I'm doing, or it might be that the content's specifications (length, medium, etc.) are not convenient.
The second test is, if I am not going to consume this content now, am I going to consume it later? And if I think the answer is yes then it gets added to my queues. For articles, that's my Wallabag. For YouTube, that's my "Watch Later." For podcasts, that's my, well, queue.
The third test is if, when I see the content later in my queue, does it get consumed? In many cases, the answer is no. In some cases this is simply due to the interest in that topic being gone. Or perhaps I've already learned about the topic of the content through other means. Or it might be that the immediacy of that content has passed.
Sometimes I'll leave things in my queues for weeks. But I have found that in general, if an item languishes in my queue for three weeks, the odds are very high that that item isn't going to get consumed.
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Last night I began my second attempt at 'The Three-Body Problem' by Cixin Liu. I have previously attempted it as an audio book and found it too dense to follow. I'm hoping as a physical trade paperback I'll find it more digestible.
And, on my drive to work this morning, I started a new sci-fi audiobook 'Sleeping Giants' by Sylvain Neuvel. I saw someone recommend it on #BookTok and decided to give it a shot since the audiobook was available from the library. 30 minutes in and enjoying it so far, we'll see how it goes.
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The new reading stack
Stack, in this case, refers to the usage for 'stack' as a package / unit of technology. Used for 'stack' of servers and the technology used by them. I enjoyed this post because it shares some very interesting sites, many I already knew, but I am definitely going to check out readng.co as a replacement for Goodreads.
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