Stella
I started off loving this so much up until around the midpoint. Then it started to drag a little and some new characters were introduced (I think they should have been introduced much earlier because they ended up playing a major role)... I still don't really understand many of the character's motivations, but nevertheless, it was an enjoyable read.
I suppose I had super high expectations after I read her superb novel Americanah.
How Not to Die: Discover the Foods Scientifically Proven to Prevent and Reverse Disease
Michael Greger,Gene Stone,+2 more
Admittedly, I skimmed the first part (mainly because as a lapsed vegan, I was more or less familiar with the benefits of the WFPB diet) and went straight to Part 2 Daily Dozen where I underlined many parts and got inspired to go WFPB again.
There is so much conflicting info about food and healthy eating (and I have been obsessively reading over the past few months, trying to inspire myself to lose some weight)
Usually, it is all about eating organic meats, green veggies, berries and no other fruit, no potatoes (good old potatoes), but avocados in heaps and all sorts of oils.
How Not to Die is all about fruits(all), veggies (all) and grains (all) - to pick and choose from. Nuts and seeds. And no oils. I've been there and lapsed when I left the Middle East (where such food is abundant) and came back to my home country (which is all about meat) and I am not an enthusiastic cook.
I must get over it and start cooking for myself and my family.
I enjoyed this book. At least for now, it inspired me.
Allen Zadoff is Allen Carr of overeating. Even though I am probably a problematic eater rather than an overeater, boy do I relate to so much in this book. More of a manifesto this autobiographical story is not trying (and is explicitly) not a diet book. I did wait, as he predicted, to a permanent loss secret, there isn't one. There is only control and discipline and self-awareness.
Eye-opening and well written, composed of short, interesting chapters and a really likable narrator. Highly recommended for everyone on a diet rollecoaster and eating disorders.
While I rate this book high for its entertainment value, it would be 5* high for me (it is easily readable, fun, at times laugh out loud funny and it has an occasional gem you feel like you want to underline) I couldn't help but perceive it as terribly pretentious, assuming it speaks for all the humans.
It is in fact representative of the Western world, but the WEIRD one at that (Western, educated, industrialized, rich and democratic (WEIRD) societies) As with research participation, WEIRD populations represent as much as 80% of study participants, but only 12% of the world's population — and with that are not only unrepresentative of humans as a species, but on many measures they're outliers.
Once I learned about WEIRD research, I can't unlearn it. I see it everywhere.
And it is extremely evident in this book. So this supposedly highly intelligent alien comes to Earth, lands (teleports) in Oxford, assumes the body of a maths professor and goes on making all sorts of generalizations about humans. And then leaves a list of 100 things he learned about the species that again, largely is applicable only to this specific population, ignoring 90% of everyone else.
But other than that, I know, I am being really petty, it is not supposed to be a hard sci-fi book or anything, I enjoyed it thoroughly.
It's not the book, it's me. I rarely find a non-scifi fiction I like and I didn't realize this was a romance. It grabbed me from page one to about page 20. But i thought i should finish it, then another 50 pages and I realised the book will go on alternating between two main characters until page 475. I didn't have the time to devote to it. It didn't keep me invested in the characters. Some dialogue was cringy and the plot spun out... But maybe it wasn't. Maybe I am just having this love hate relationship with fiction these days.
This review is exactly what I think about this book.
I really enjoyed this character driven sci-fi novel.
Some mindblowing concepts there, check out this passage:
“One second ago they were in Earth orbit. Now they've delivered their cargo to the surface of Mars. I mean now, Diane, literally now. It's already happened, it's done. So let a minute pass on your watch. That's approximately a hundred and ninety years by an outside clock.”
“That's a lot, of course, but you can't make over a planet in two hundred years, can you?”
“So now it's two hundred Spin years into the experiment. Right now, as we speak, any bacterial colonies that survived the trip will have been reproducing on Mars for two centuries. In an hour, they will have been there eleven thousand four hundred years. This time tomorrow they'll have been multiplying for almost two hundred seventy-four thousand years.”
“Okay, Jase. I get the idea.”
“This time next week, 1.9 million years.”
“Okay.”
“A month, 8.3 million years.”
“This time next year, one hundred million years.”
“Yes, but—”
“On Earth, one hundred million years is roughly the span of time between the emergence of life from the sea and your last birthday.
I don't really know what to think about this one. It was recommended to me by my mother in law who (successfully, I think) raised four boys.
But the whole time I felt that the author was describing these little alien species, rather than little humans. My boy is only five so I may revisit this later, but so far I found it kind of offensive. Are we really that different?
Although the author does state that the book is for fathers and sons and maybe fathers would identify better with the concept. I totally didn't.
I reread this in 2022 - and I feel about the same now. My son is 12.
An eye-opener in so many ways. Not all of it is applied directly to me (or to every student), but it allowed me to deep dive into my own thinking and string out connections I did not know existed.
But as with everything, caution about taking anything as the only “right way”. (there are communities created around this concept of note makers, there are people paying thousands of dollars to take one course or another that promises to teach them how, etc....)
I love books on the topic, but I have perhaps read too many of them and gor tired of regurgitated and repetitive outlier stories. I should really stop borrowing (another e-library read) books on the topic. Nothing new here for me. But if you have never read another book about focus, minimalism, productivity, deep work etc. there will be some gems in this one.
Still, I'd probably go for Cal Newport's Deep Work.
This book was a wee bit too simplistic for my taste.
This booklet was written in 1998 and with the whole note-making, linking and sharing boom, Zettlekasten, etc. going on now, it is literally decades ahead of its time, explaining the manual system before we had Obsidian, Roam, and even Evernote.
Absolutely impressive if totally unedited. (the author uses sentences such as “if I forget to talk about (this) later in the book... email me at ()
Thanks to this book, I learned that the word Wiki was coined in 1995, because the author used it and I was like, wait, this can't be from the nineties. It is.
Also, it looks like Kimbro was the first to use the term MOC (Maps of Content) in regards to his “index” like mapping of similar notes.
While largely irrelevant to those of us who use digital systems now, it is an interesting insight into how to effectively link your own thinking and notes as opposed to ‘knowledge collecting'
Two superb sci-fi books so far in 2021 for me - first [b:Seveneves 22816087 Seveneves Neal Stephenson https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1449142000l/22816087.SY75.jpg 42299347] and now this one. The books you can't read before bedtime or else you won't sleep. Or you will be haunted in your dreams. In a good way.I don't know how to review this book without giving it away and I really don't like spoilers. It's a book you read once and then savor again for all the parts you rushed through because you needed to know what happens next. No doubt, like with Seveneves, I will be thinking about this book for months to come. Can't wait for the movie version (with Ryan Gosling apparently!) although, not sure how they could ever do it justice.PS. I highlighted some clever passages that I wanted to share but realized they too would constitute spoilers. I am so glad I didn't read any reviews of the book before I finished reading it. (or before writing this one) Off to read some now.
It was a book borrowed from the library so I don't mind (that much) that I didn't like it (that much)
Talking about weight set points (which was a neat thing to learn about, although intuitively we know about it even without having to be told about it) and some scientific, anthropological, interesting facts were what I picked up this book for. I actually did not realize it was going to be a book on telling me how to eat to lose weight.
But as I was reading, it turned out to be exactly that and that I will have to wait for all the way to Part III of the book to find out these new things about eating and losing weight. The author takes his time, builds up our hopes (I skimmed Part II because I was eager to get to Part III).
Anyway, in Part III you discover the most environmentally unfriendly way of eating as the right one: meat, dairy, and more meat and more dairy. Only natural not processed. (I wonder how sausages and cheese count as unprocessed but whatever)
But this is not Keto, he says.
Add some (very little) carbs (like potatoes) and fruit (but be careful it's full of sugar)
Please!
I just cannot trust any book that is loading us with protein and depriving us of the goodness of fruit and starchy vegetables.
It is not a sustainable diet for most of us. (not long term anyway)
Also, the author talks about not cutting down our calories to advise exactly that at the end of the book.
He does tell you, though, that if you are obese, bariatric surgery is the way to go.
I can't recommend this book for its eating advice.
Otherwise, it is an interesting book into some scientific and anthropological insights into the human diet.
Great beginning that hooked me from the first page. I bought the book. After the first job (chapter) it got... a bit tedious to read because I had no idea where it was going or why. The jobs and description of the people involved were still interesting enough, but I needed to know why I was reading.
I also needed to know more about the protagonist than the snippets that were revealed almost as a side note.
I guess I stopped caring.
About great beginnings - this happens with so many of the new books I pick up, it is almost as if the author's entire energy goes into those first 50 pages to avoid the slush pile. (understandably in some ways)
The rest of it just wasn't enough to keep me interested to keep reading.
I am going to have to come back here and write a proper review but for now, here it is.
This is the perfect hard sci-fi book. It has everything you could ever want in it. It also played into my every fear, i.e. the total destruction of the planet and the end of the human race. It went on for 500 pages, at times I literally could not breathe! I had two nightmares inspired by this book.
I learned so much, too. For example, that may be, faced with complete annihilation people would not necessarily go greedy and crazy and dive into total anarchy. I like that premise better than the usual, where the majority become Machiavelian beasts (an assumption made in so many of my favorite TV shows including The 100, The Walking Dead, etc.)
I will never look at the moon the same way again.
This book was its own journey. I remember it as an adventure of my own. I'd dive into my bed, turn off the lights and read it on my faintly lit Kindle for .. hours. I could not stop. I love many books I read, but it's been a long time since a book took me into its world so entirely. I am grateful.
Having said all that, I did not enjoy the last chapter as much (I think it goes on for 200 pages). I will not go into details for a fear of spoilers, but I felt like that could have been a different book.
This was a book of hope for all humankind and I just absolutely love it. A must-read for any sci-fi fan out there.