2023 Reasonable Read List

The Not So Long List of Things I Read in 2023

Read lists are one of the most useful things that people I follow put out. So I try to get one of mine out once a year. Books are underrated. Even as technology increases how we take in information, the book remains undefeated as the best and most affordable way for someone to transfer 100K or so words of knowledge or entertainment at scale.

I’m not a fast reader. But I’m persistent. I also don’t like to waste time on books I don’t like so following the lead of trusted sources is important. It’s worth acknowledging that simply by sharing their expertise, I’ve been the beneficiary of hundreds of hours of enjoyment. What a gift! Hollis Robbins turned me back on to the 19th century literature I wasn’t ready to read when it was assigned to me in school. Anna Gat has started an online community called Interintellect that is an amazing collection of curious intellectuals that share the art and science that inspires them. And if you’ve followed me at all you know economist Tyler Cowen, whose blog Marginal Revolution and accompanying podcast Conversations with Tyler remains the single best source for material I’ve ever seen. If you can only follow one source, Tyler is the one with the most depth and breadth.

The breakdown is reasonably diverse. 17 books worth talking about: four Sci Fi, seven History, three fiction from what we’ll call the classic domain and two from contemporary fiction and one from the social sciences domain. Here’s the list in the order of which I could remember them.

Two Ursula K. Le Guin Books

The Left Hand of Darkness: It was the first Le Guin book I read. It’s about an ambassador to a foreign world of singular gender. Though it’s technically in the SciFi genre, true to Le Guinn’s other books it’s more of an anthropological study focused on what the world would be like with a key different aspect; this time without genders or sexual tension. It’s also better prose than the average SciFi.

The Dispossessed : A scientist from a sort of autonomous collective settlement on a moon travels back to the capitalist (Earth like) world from which his ancestors left. The main question I thought Le Guinn tries to take on is where the better rules live. Inside us? Externally as dictated by law? Other?

Two Tom Holland (not Spiderman, the other one) Books:

Rubicon, The Last Years of the Roman Republic and Dynasty, The Rise and Fall of the House of Caesar: I wrote an essay on these two books this summer as they’re both remarkable works. I’ve read enough dry history and even dryer Roman history to recognize something better when I see it. Holland focuses on the characters to tell the story of the state. And he does it with humor and irony and a style that puts them into context for a 21st century reader. Both were great. Highly recommend.

Bleak House by Charles Dickens: Like most Dickens it’s the good, the bad and the ugly brought to form through characters pulled from a 19th Century England that exists in our collective consciousnesses today as much designed by anything as Dickens books. The benefit (beyond entertainment) of reading Dickens is to understand the consistency of moral tensions that exist and have always existed. Dickens’ world may be as foreign to modernity as an alien planet, but the rules of morality persist as do the slippery slopes.

Redeployment Phil Klay: The best book I’ve read about the wars that I served in is a novel not a memoir or a historical retelling. I wrote a review on Phil’s book and hosted a talk on fiction writing. This is a masterpiece of truth.

Dune Messiah by Frank Herbert: I don’t know why I stopped after the original Dune when I read it decades ago other than the fact that I didn’t really read that much back then. The problem with doing so is that I’ve grown so attached to the original Dune characters over the years that reading Messiah was a bit of a downer. The book is great. But Herbert tells the Dune tale like a very real historical chronicle. History knows no plot armor. So your favorite characters are cast off or corrupted unceremoniously with the tide of time. Which is a me problem of course and not a problem with the book. But it’s worth stating that if you love Muad’Dib or Chani from the first book, be flexible…

Of Boys and Men Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do About It by Richard V. Reeves: I’ve got three sons and recognized some patterns in the description of the problem the book takes on. I didn’t really see anything interesting, new or even politically viable in the solutions. I thought there were some missed opportunities here for a book that has “what to do about it” in the title.

Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift: Way more readable than you’d think a 300 year old book would be. It’s also interesting to see how Swift employs the sorts of extreme analogs that many SciFi authors of more modern books use to make points. I still don’t really know his main point though as there’s contradictions from each part to the next. It’s possible that’s his point. And he also has a very strange fascination with shit.

Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand: Yes, I read Atlas Shrugged in 2023 as a full grown adult. And I recommend it. The book, by now, has approached biblical status in that if you stare at it for long enough it will tell you whatever you want it to. It’s clear that the characters and situations of the book are caricatures of reality and I’m surprised how many people forget that. In it there are mostly only two types of people. Productive heroes (very rare) or some form of looter (very common). And if you are the productive, you also believe in violent sex? These aren’t real people nor do I think that’s Rand’s point. There’s an essay to link Sinclair Lewis’ (who Rand greatly admired) Babbit and the impact of Atlas Shrugged on the identity seeking politically rotted modern American conservative movement. And I guess I’ve got to write it.

Cryptonomicron by Neil Stephenson: Like most Stephenson books it’s very long and very weird…but magnificent. If you like World War II history and computers and math (like I do) have I got a book for you…

No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy: This is as close to the movie as any adaptation you’ll ever see because McCarthy wrote it first as a screenplay, then a book and then allowed the Coen brothers to adapt it. McCarthy died this year.

Superinfinitate: The Transformation of John Donne by Katherine Rundell: This was my favorite book this year. Rundell also writes amazing children’s books and her style makes an otherwise bleak (17th century London and dandy poets) brilliant. I read it on a work trip to London, more specifically Westminster. I highly recommend it.

Einstein: His Life and Universe by Walter Isaacson: Classic Isaacson. One should endeavor to have their life chronicled by him. Einstein comes off as more remarkable in the book than I had thought before, which is rare. The only other historical character I found that to be true of was Lincoln.

Road to Surrender:Three Men and the Countdown to the end of World War II by Evan Thomas: It’s not in style to believe the right thing to do in 1945 was to drop two atomic bombs on Japan. Thomas dives deep into the decision and the information that the men who made it were sifting through, including representation from the Japanese side. It’s well done and very relevant for the events of our time.

Plagues upon the Earth: Disease and the Course of Human History by Kyle Harper: This is a sprawling work in the spirit of Diamond’s Guns Germs and Steel focused on the germs. But not really. Harper’s point is that we don’t live in a world impacted by pathogens that create disease. The world we live in is an intertwined world that both created and was created by disease.

Empire, Incorporated: The Corporations That Built British Colonialism by Philip J. Stein: This is the driest book I read this year. I like dry on some topics though and this is one of them. It’s not for everyone but if you really want a source for understanding how British colonialism started and why it was different from the other colonial exploits, this is it.