Nothing like wintertime for curling up with a good book. Preferably in a Gothic reading room, with snow outside.
It’s been a while since we did a Book Pub, so this one covers books we read (or abandoned reading) sometime in the last couple of years.
Some of the books I read:
Daemon, by Daniel Suarez. Techno-thriller (book 1 of 2 in series).
In a way, this is the opposite of the AI story so often told now. A daemon is a type of computer program that runs as a background process, performing various tasks without user control or direct interaction. Here, the founder of a large gaming company creates a massively distributed daemon that — while not intelligent in any human sense, nor capable of having will/goals or autonomy — uses pre-programmed rules to manipulate people into working for it, becoming a dangerous world power.
Here is a good and more thorough plot synopsis.
Rating/Recommend: Highly recommend for fans of the genre. One of the greats of the genre IMO.
Character Limit, by Kate Conger and Ryan Mac. New York Times tech reporters report detailed and well-researched account of Musk’s purchase of Twitter.
Rating/Recommend:
Doomsday Book, by Connie Willis. Sci-fi about time-travelling Oxford historians. A recommendation from GI!
Rating/Recommend:
Slow Productivity, by Cal Newport.
The Lost Art of Accomplishment Without Burnout (subtitle as summary).
Rating/Recommend:
Elon Musk, by Walter Isaacson.
Quickly veered into hagiography.
Rating/Recommend: No, cannot recommend, because Elon.
What You Are Looking For Is in the Library, by Michiko Aoyama (translated from Japanese).
Rating/Recommend
Started but not yet finished:
Trust, by Hernan Diaz. Pulitzer Prize winner.
