Bookshelf

The Forever War

by Joe Haldeman

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

The Forever War

by Joe Haldeman

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

A Hugo Award winner for a reason, Joe Haldeman’s military sci-fi epic takes one character skipping across the surface of time through a thousand year interstellar war. It’s grim, it’s episodic, and it’s brilliant. The book portrays the futility of war with a sharpness that is just as relevant now as it was in the Viet Nam era during which it was written.
Richard III

by William Shakespeare

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Richard III

by William Shakespeare

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

I love Shakespeare’s great villains and Richard III is one of the greatest of them all. Unapologetically evil, it’s a joy to watch him scheme, lie, and murder his way to the top (though his subsequent downfall feels a bit rushed and perfunctory, as if the bard knew he had gotten past the juicy bits and was eager to wrap it up). On this read I really noticed how much House of Cards and even A Song of Ice and Fire draw elements from it.
Foundation and Empire (Foundation #2)

by Isaac Asimov

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

Foundation and Empire (Foundation #2)

by Isaac Asimov

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

The second book in Asimov’s famed Foundation series. It’s clear that he’d grown quite a bit as a writer by this one, with a plot more intricate, subtle, and less predictable. A classic for a reason. (In case you’re wondering, I have no interest in Apple’s new TV series based on the books. It’s not the kind of thing that can be done properly on screen.)
The Brothers Karamazov

by Fyodor Dostoevsky

★ ★ ☆ ☆ ☆

The Brothers Karamazov

by Fyodor Dostoevsky

★ ★ ☆ ☆ ☆

My book club chose this one to read and I was relatively interested to see how Dostoyevsky’s work stands up to my high school memories of Crime and Punishment and fragments of The Grand Inquisitor section of this book. The answer is not so good. The book is rambling in the extreme and most of the plot involves around a quasi-incestuous, middle school style game of he-said-she-said romance melodrama. It does explore philosophical themes, but the central question of whether a person can be moral without faith seems to me (as a humanist atheist) to be pretty well answered and not particularly germane to contemporary readers.
Antony and Cleopatra

by William Shakespeare

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Antony and Cleopatra

by William Shakespeare

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

Continuing my Shakespeare reading project, this particular play has always been a personal favorite. The titular characters are so fully realized, mercurial and tragic, that I really love them for all their flaws. Reading it this time, I kept picturing it filmed as a space opera with larger than life production design!
The Best of Greg Egan

by Greg Egan

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

The Best of Greg Egan

by Greg Egan

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

A brilliant imagination, full of big ideas!
Atomic Design

by Brad Frost

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

Atomic Design

by Brad Frost

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

I think this book would have been mind blowing if I had read it when it was new. But so many of its ideas are now mainstream in the design and development world that it feels very old hat. Something of a victim of its own success as far as the reading experience goes.
The Winter's Tale

by William Shakespeare

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

The Winter's Tale

by William Shakespeare

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

This is an interesting one. The first half is almost all drama and the second half mostly comedy, with a big time jump in the middle. I prefer the former, a portrait of someone mad with jealousy destroying himself and all he holds dear.
The Sign of Four (Sherlock Holmes, #2)

by Arthur Conan Doyle
King Henry VI, Part 3

by William Shakespeare
Invisible Kingdom, Vol. 1: Walking the Path

by G. Willow Wilson

★ ★ ☆ ☆ ☆
Parable of the Sower: A Graphic Novel Adaptation

by Damian Duffy

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆
The Anthropocene Reviewed

by John Green

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆
Letterforms: Typeface Design from Past to Future

by Timothy Samara

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆
Measure for Measure

by William Shakespeare
Spider-Gwen: Ghost-Spider, Vol. 1: Spider-Geddon

by Seanan McGuire

★ ★ ☆ ☆ ☆
Project Hail Mary

by Andy Weir

★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Once & Future, Vol. 1: The King is Undead

by Kieron Gillen

★ ★ ☆ ☆ ☆
Type, Form & Function: A Handbook on the Fundamentals of Typography

by Jason Tselentis

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆
Monstress, Vol. 5: Warchild

by Marjorie M. Liu

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆
Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI

by David Grann

★ ★ ★ ★ ★
The New Mutants Classic, Vol. 1

by Chris Claremont

★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆
Julius Caesar

by William Shakespeare
Trekonomics: The Economics of Star Trek

by Manu Saadia

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

Trekonomics: The Economics of Star Trek

by Manu Saadia

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

A lovely little book that takes a serious look at the post-scarcity economics portrayed in Star Trek. This is my kind of work of science fiction analysis, one that sees past the space battles and catchphrases and focusses on the deeper questions the scifi poses about our society, our future, and our selves.