Looking forward to the release - publication - of The Mirror and the Light, the third book in the Wolf Hall/Thomas Cromwell trilogy by Hilary Mantel in early March.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Spoilers What Book Are You Reading?
- Thread starter Huntn
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Finally getting around to reading Esi Edugyan's Washington Black. Forgot I'd borrowed it (as an ebook) for 14 days not 21, so the thing is now well en route to self-destruction and I'm trying not to rush through it just for knowing that. Hope I can renew the loan before someone ends up on the wait list for the book. I'm enjoying it, although in later parts of the novel it has grown maybe a few too many plot threads, more than I had anticipated in the earlier going. The story of a slave from Barbados, but a journey that along with a abolitionist plantation owner vaults him from the Caribbean to Canada to London to Morocco... and requires not a little suspension of disbelief along the way.
I just finished reading this one. Fantastic book and one I recommend to everyone and anyone.
Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World – and Why Things Are Better Than You Think
"When asked simple questions about global trends - why the world's population is increasing; how many young women go to school; how many of us live in poverty - we systematically get the answers wrong. So wrong that a chimpanzee choosing answers at random will consistently outguess journalists, Nobel laureates, and investment bankers.
In Factfulness, Professor of International Health and a man who can make data sing, Hans Rosling, together with his two long-time collaborators Anna and Ola, offers a radical new explanation of why this happens, and reveals the ten instincts that distort our perspective.
It turns out that the world, for all its imperfections, is in a much better state than we might think. But when we worry about everything all the time instead of embracing a worldview based on facts, we can lose our ability to focus on the things that threaten us most.
Inspiring and revelatory, filled with lively anecdotes and moving stories, Factfulness is an urgent and essential book that will change the way you see the world."
Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World – and Why Things Are Better Than You Think
Factfulness
Factfulness: The stress-reducing habit of only carrying opinions for which you have strong supporting facts. When asked simple questions...
www.goodreads.com
"When asked simple questions about global trends - why the world's population is increasing; how many young women go to school; how many of us live in poverty - we systematically get the answers wrong. So wrong that a chimpanzee choosing answers at random will consistently outguess journalists, Nobel laureates, and investment bankers.
In Factfulness, Professor of International Health and a man who can make data sing, Hans Rosling, together with his two long-time collaborators Anna and Ola, offers a radical new explanation of why this happens, and reveals the ten instincts that distort our perspective.
It turns out that the world, for all its imperfections, is in a much better state than we might think. But when we worry about everything all the time instead of embracing a worldview based on facts, we can lose our ability to focus on the things that threaten us most.
Inspiring and revelatory, filled with lively anecdotes and moving stories, Factfulness is an urgent and essential book that will change the way you see the world."
I picked this one up at the library 2 days ago and finished it last night. It was a bit of a page-turner for me and I really enjoyed it.
Some of the ideas and practices in the book are things I've already taken steps toward and have done to reduce my digital addiction over the last year or so. A few other things I intend on doing starting right away. Most notably, for me, I leave my home PC on 24/7 and it's always ready for me to sit down and use. Now I'm going to be turning it off when not in use and strive to only sit at it once or twice a day to check up on things, or when I have actual productive things to work on. Turning it off and on isn't really a hard thing to do because it boots to desktop in 11 seconds. But the simple act of having it off will prevent me from unnecessarily sitting at it and doing things of little value that I tend to waste too much time doing.
Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World
by Cal Newport
"Georgetown computer scientist Cal Newport's Deep Work sparked a movement around the idea that unbroken concentration produces far more value than the electronic busyness that defines the modern work day. But his readers had an urgent follow-up question: What about technology in our personal lives?
In recent years, our culture's relationship with personal technology has transformed from something exciting into something darker. Innovations like smartphones and social media are useful, but many of us are increasingly troubled by how much control these tools seem to exert over our daily experiences--including how we spend our free time and how we feel about ourselves.
In Digital Minimalism, Newport proposes a bold solution: a minimalist approach to technology use in which you radically reduce the time you spend online, focusing on a small set of carefully-selected activities while happily ignoring the rest.
He mounts a vigorous defense for this less-is-more approach, combining historical examples with case studies of modern digital minimalists to argue that this philosophy isn't a rejection of technology, but instead a necessary realignment to ensure that these tools serve us, not the other way around.
To make these principles practical, he takes us inside the growing subculture of digital minimalists who have built rich lives on a foundation of intentional technology use, and details a decluttering process that thousands have already used to simplify their online lives. He also stresses the importance of never clicking "like," explores the underappreciated value of analog hobbies, and draws lessons from the "attention underground"--a resistance movement fighting the tech companies' attempts to turn us into gadget addicts.
Digital Minimalism is an indispensable guide for anyone looking to reclaim their life from the alluring diversions of the digital world."
Some of the ideas and practices in the book are things I've already taken steps toward and have done to reduce my digital addiction over the last year or so. A few other things I intend on doing starting right away. Most notably, for me, I leave my home PC on 24/7 and it's always ready for me to sit down and use. Now I'm going to be turning it off when not in use and strive to only sit at it once or twice a day to check up on things, or when I have actual productive things to work on. Turning it off and on isn't really a hard thing to do because it boots to desktop in 11 seconds. But the simple act of having it off will prevent me from unnecessarily sitting at it and doing things of little value that I tend to waste too much time doing.
Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World
by Cal Newport
"Georgetown computer scientist Cal Newport's Deep Work sparked a movement around the idea that unbroken concentration produces far more value than the electronic busyness that defines the modern work day. But his readers had an urgent follow-up question: What about technology in our personal lives?
In recent years, our culture's relationship with personal technology has transformed from something exciting into something darker. Innovations like smartphones and social media are useful, but many of us are increasingly troubled by how much control these tools seem to exert over our daily experiences--including how we spend our free time and how we feel about ourselves.
In Digital Minimalism, Newport proposes a bold solution: a minimalist approach to technology use in which you radically reduce the time you spend online, focusing on a small set of carefully-selected activities while happily ignoring the rest.
He mounts a vigorous defense for this less-is-more approach, combining historical examples with case studies of modern digital minimalists to argue that this philosophy isn't a rejection of technology, but instead a necessary realignment to ensure that these tools serve us, not the other way around.
To make these principles practical, he takes us inside the growing subculture of digital minimalists who have built rich lives on a foundation of intentional technology use, and details a decluttering process that thousands have already used to simplify their online lives. He also stresses the importance of never clicking "like," explores the underappreciated value of analog hobbies, and draws lessons from the "attention underground"--a resistance movement fighting the tech companies' attempts to turn us into gadget addicts.
Digital Minimalism is an indispensable guide for anyone looking to reclaim their life from the alluring diversions of the digital world."
The biggest impact I see is connectiveness to the world through our digital devices. I’m not making an excuse, but my impression are these items feed our social needs, in some case substitute for personal face to face action, as I see a room full of people looking at their phones, I honk my horn at the guy playing with his phone at the green light or as I sit here typing on my iPad. ?
This book was a big help for me, because I’ve always been a slow reader. I learned a few tricks and new techniques from it and I look forward to reading more books in less time.
This book and the one on digital minimialism I read in two nights each.
This book and the one on digital minimialism I read in two nights each.
The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne.
Cyril Avery is not a real Avery or at least that's what his adoptive parents tell him. And he never will be. But if he isn't a real Avery, then who is he?
Born out of wedlock to a teenage girl cast out from her rural Irish community and adopted by a well-to-do if eccentric Dublin couple via the intervention of a hunchbacked Redemptorist nun, Cyril is adrift in the world, anchored only tenuously by his heartfelt friendship with the infinitely more glamourous and dangerous Julian Woodbead.
At the mercy of fortune and coincidence, he will spend a lifetime coming to know himself and where he came from - and over his three score years and ten, will struggle to discover an identity, a home, a country and much more.
In this, Boyne's most transcendent work to date, we are shown the story of Ireland from the 1940s to today through the eyes of one ordinary man. The Heart's Invisible Furies is a novel to make you laugh and cry while reminding us all of the redemptive power of the human spirit.
Cyril Avery is not a real Avery or at least that's what his adoptive parents tell him. And he never will be. But if he isn't a real Avery, then who is he?
Born out of wedlock to a teenage girl cast out from her rural Irish community and adopted by a well-to-do if eccentric Dublin couple via the intervention of a hunchbacked Redemptorist nun, Cyril is adrift in the world, anchored only tenuously by his heartfelt friendship with the infinitely more glamourous and dangerous Julian Woodbead.
At the mercy of fortune and coincidence, he will spend a lifetime coming to know himself and where he came from - and over his three score years and ten, will struggle to discover an identity, a home, a country and much more.
In this, Boyne's most transcendent work to date, we are shown the story of Ireland from the 1940s to today through the eyes of one ordinary man. The Heart's Invisible Furies is a novel to make you laugh and cry while reminding us all of the redemptive power of the human spirit.
I tried speed reading in college and dropped it.
I’d like to know how good you feel your retention is?
How does it work for technical reading or a manual?
And would you choose to speed read a novel?
I just started The Elements of Style by Strunk and White since effective and efficient writing has become a lost art.
I’m very interested in checking out Digital Minimalism @SandboxGeneral . Thanks for pointing that one out.
I’m very interested in checking out Digital Minimalism @SandboxGeneral . Thanks for pointing that one out.
Different texts require different types of reading.
For example, I can speed read fiction, or a history book; for, I find that facts - who, what, where, why, when, how - can be absorbed fairly easy (and rapidly); however, technical manuals, works of theory, or philosophy, require slow, thoughtful, careful and concentrated reading.
As this book points out, speed reading is like learning to ride a bicycle. You need practice and with a bicycle, we start off with training wheels. Once we get enough practice we can remove the training wheels and go much faster. Speed reading is much the same way. Once we learn and understand how and why our eyes and brain operate we can begin to increase speed while simultaneously increasing comprehension of what is being read.
I'm only a couple of days into this new realization and with just a couple of changes in the layout of my Kindle, I'm reading much quicker than before.
The easiest way to get started is to, on a Kindle or e-reader that allows you to change font settings, is to increase the font to where there are no more than 6-8 words per line. Then increase the line spacing so there is a bit more between each line. This allows you to see the words more clearly and more quickly due to how the eyes and the "saccades" work.
For deadtree (physical books) there are techniques to use to increase speed as well. That involves using your finger to scan down the page and have your eyes follow the finger, not the other way around. There are more explanations and techniques in the book, more than what I'm putting here.
Just doing that increased my speed noticeably.
Different types of books, novels vs. technical manuals, vs. non-fiction, will read differently and therefore will vary in how fast one can read them. But the overarching principle remains the same.
Go get that book on speed reading on your Kindle and give it a look. I got it for free on the Kindle Lending Library. I wasn't even looking for it but saw it as one of those advertisements on the lock screen of the Kindle and figured I'd give it a try.
I learnt to speed read in hospital; when I was ten years old, I was in hospital for a week, having my appendix removed, (and I was very ill when admitted) and then spending the best part of a week recovering from that operation.
To the astonishment and incredulity of staff, when initially admitted, and offered the choice of a bed in a ward or in a private room, I opted for a private room - cue sound of some staff using that awful saccharine tone some adults adopt when talking with children, "no, you'd really prefer to be in with the other children, wouldn't you?" accompanied by a sickly smile, and a glance at my mother that suggested complete incomprehension - but I was clear and firm and quite articulate that no, I didn't wish to be with other children, that, in fact, I far preferred a room of my own, and solitude, and my mother (bless her) supported me.
Anyway, as I recovered, and visitors asked what I wanted by way of gifts, I always answered "books". And books I received, in considerable quantities.
Impatience drove me - to find out what happened next, along with the fact that in my private room, I wasn't disturbed except by occasional visitors (usually family), and medical staff, while the restrictions - such as early bed times - that existed at home, no longer applied in the hospital, where I could read until the ungodly hour of 10.30, or 11 at night without any adult interfering with my solitary pleasures and telling me to turn the light out and go to sleep.
By the time I was discharged, with an armful of books, I was well on the way to being an accomplished speed reader.
To the astonishment and incredulity of staff, when initially admitted, and offered the choice of a bed in a ward or in a private room, I opted for a private room - cue sound of some staff using that awful saccharine tone some adults adopt when talking with children, "no, you'd really prefer to be in with the other children, wouldn't you?" accompanied by a sickly smile, and a glance at my mother that suggested complete incomprehension - but I was clear and firm and quite articulate that no, I didn't wish to be with other children, that, in fact, I far preferred a room of my own, and solitude, and my mother (bless her) supported me.
Anyway, as I recovered, and visitors asked what I wanted by way of gifts, I always answered "books". And books I received, in considerable quantities.
Impatience drove me - to find out what happened next, along with the fact that in my private room, I wasn't disturbed except by occasional visitors (usually family), and medical staff, while the restrictions - such as early bed times - that existed at home, no longer applied in the hospital, where I could read until the ungodly hour of 10.30, or 11 at night without any adult interfering with my solitary pleasures and telling me to turn the light out and go to sleep.
By the time I was discharged, with an armful of books, I was well on the way to being an accomplished speed reader.
Last edited:
It’s like a superpower. My father-in-law can speed read and his basement is like a library.
There are three rooms in my mother's house - well, my house - that play host to floor to ceiling bookshelves.
That sounds like a dream.
I studied English Lit and Horticulture at university. One of my first jobs was as a grounds restoration manager on an estate with extensive gardens. I lived in the caretakers cottage, but had a key to the mansion and could come and go as I pleased.
There was a “library” in the estate with all hardcover books dating from the early 1800’s through the 1950’s when the estate was entrusted to a non-profit (my former employer).
I am so impressed to walk into a home (of any kind) and find a collection like you describe. Those spaces foster the calmest feelings on this planet for me.
My primary interest in speed reading in college was for learning. The reason I dropped speed reading was because it did not suit me for learning and technical reading, and it had a negative impact on my immersion in casual reading. That is an impression from 45 years ago.
Most of my reading is casual these days and when I get hold of a good book, the last thing I want to do is speed through it, I tend to slow down, savor it, and experience it. I don’t want to skim though it. Typically when I am immersed in a book, the story is displayed in my head as a visual representation like a movie. That is one of my clues if I am enjoying a book and speed reading from what I remember is like watching a movie at 2x speed, which had a negative impact on immersion. An analogy would be if someone told you a story like at the end of one of those commercials where they speed talk though all of the legal notifications, and yes you can barely understand it, but you hear and understand the content.
I admit this could be an intelligence or intellectual limitation on my part and it is possible there are prople who can speed read a novel and be fully, pleasurably immersed and impacted by it.
Last edited:
I started this last night and I'm already over halfway through it. It's a very good read so far and it's every bit of what higher expectations I had of it. Highly recommended.
Just starting "Non-Stop" by Brian Aldiss, a classic SF generation ship story.
Just starting "Non-Stop" by Brian Aldiss, a classic SF generation ship story.
I remember how I enjoyed reading that book when I was a kid
Yeah, I first read it over 40 years ago under its other title, "Starship". Amazingly enough, the book has held up well over the years.
Sounds interesting.Prisoners of geography.
[automerge]1581515119[/automerge]
I wonder why they changed the name (now or then)?
Apropos of today being Abraham Lincolns birthday (Feb 12, 1809), I just finished reading this book this morning. A most excellent read, highly motivational and very recommended to anyone in leadership or management positions.
Lincoln on Leadership: Executive Strategies for Tough Times
by Donald T. Phillips
www.goodreads.com
After finishing the Lincoln book this morning, I began this one. Another one I picked up a the local library book sale a few months back, along with the Lincoln book.
Thomas Jefferson
(The American Presidents #3)
by Joyce Appleby, Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. (Editor)
Lincoln on Leadership: Executive Strategies for Tough Times
by Donald T. Phillips
Lincoln on Leadership: Executive Strategies for Tough T…
You think you have it rough? Only ten days before Abra…
After finishing the Lincoln book this morning, I began this one. Another one I picked up a the local library book sale a few months back, along with the Lincoln book.
Thomas Jefferson
(The American Presidents #3)
by Joyce Appleby, Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. (Editor)
Thomas Jefferson
An illuminating analysis of the man whose name is synonymous with American democracy Few presidents have embodied the American spirit as...
www.goodreads.com