Welcome again to Book Pub!
What are you all reading?
I didn’t get through a lot of books this month, so this will be brief:
The Story of the Stone (Vol. 3: The Warning Voice and Vol. 4: The Debt of Tears) by Cao Xueqin (Vol. 3: David Hawkes translation; Vol. 4 with Gao E, John Minford transation)
(Vol. 3: Goodreads Avg. Rating. 4.43 | Amazon
(Vol. 4: Goodreads Avg. Rating 4.36 | Amazon
Recommended if you, as mentioned last time, want to really invest in a literary work or want to have a starting point to understand Chinese psychology, culture and society.
Thoughts: As mentioned last time, this book is long. In contrast with the first two volumes, the family that is the subject of the book is steadily on the decline. Still very enjoyable – I read Vol. 4 in a weekend – but the author beats readers over the head with all the foreshadowing. If you haven’t already figured it out by the subtitles, these two volumes are not exactly uplifting reads.
Full Catastrophe Living by Jon Kabat-Zinn
(Goodreads Avg. Rating 4.20 | Amazon
Recommended if you want to reduce stress in your life or are interested in learning more about mindfulness and meditation.
Thoughts: For some reason this had been on my to-read list for a while. As a skeptic of this sort of thing, I thought it was too damn long, especially the chapters where the author discusses meditation’s benefits. However, it’s definitely worth a look if you’re interested in stress reduction; Kabat-Zinn is very thorough and guides you through an 8-week stress reduction/mindfulness seminar that his program offers.
If You Can: How Millennials Can Get Rich Slowly by William J. Bernstein
(Goodreads Avg. Rating 4.21 | Amazon
Recommended if you interested in getting started on retirement savings and investing.
Thoughts: This book is a short, easy-to-read starting point for people interested in how to get started in saving and investing for retirement. Although targeted mainly at 20-somethings, this gives a nice roadmap even for those who are older. It’s also cheap – Bernstein had wanted to offer it for free, but sellers required that he charge at least a nominal amount. Note that he has “reading assignments,” though (recommended that you skip The Millionaire Next Door – terribly written book).
Image via Wikimedia Commons
