Friday, September 13, 2002
Current Reading List
I'd like to keep track of the books I'm reading (or would like to read, have already finished, etc). I've seen this sort of information written up in a sidebar that's rarely updated or just "for show" (that is, I'd like people to think that I'm reading these books...). There's also the notion of a reading "queue" (first in, first out), but that implies that reading is a purely linear process. For some types of books (e.g., novels) this may be appropriate, but I don't think most non-fiction should be read this way. I'm usually reading at least a dozen books at once. (This is not a boast; rather, it's a strategy that allows me to maintain focus - paradoxical, but it works for me.)
I'd like to have a more structured method for presenting information about what I'm reading. I have some ideas about how I'd like to do that, but I've slowly started to realize that if you wait until everything is in place, all you do is wait. So here's a list of books that I've checked out of the library. (I've also determined that the best way to ensure that I don't read a book is to buy it. If I enjoy reading it, I usually end up buying a copy that sits untouched on the bookshelf.)
- The Future of Ideas: The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World by Lawrence Lessig
- Emergence: The Connected Lives of Ants, Brains, Cities, and Software by Steven Johnson
- Small Pieces Loosely Joined: A Unified Theory of the Web by David Weinberger
- A New Kind of Science by Stephen Wolfram
- Terrorism and U.S. Foreign Policy by Paul R. Pillar
- The Bureau: The Secret History of the FBI by Ronald Kessler
- Letters to a Young Contrarian by Christopher Hitchens
- Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke
- Letters to a Young Lawyer by Alan M. Dershowitz
- e: The Story of a Number by Eli Maor
- Red Rabbit by Tom Clancy
After a long drought, I've decided to start posting again. The trouble is: What to say? My old strategy of posting interesting links and quotes with minimal commentary was becoming tiresome, and was more work than it would seem.
