pearl's bookshelf: all en-US Sun, 13 Apr 2025 09:34:00 -0700 60 pearl's bookshelf: all 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg <![CDATA[Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc]]> 89301 360 Mark Twain 1598184687 pearl 0 to-read 4.05 2013 Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc
author: Mark Twain
name: pearl
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2013
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism]]> 223436601 An explosive memoir charting one woman’s career at the heart of one of the most influential companies on the planet, Careless People gives you a front-row seat to Facebook, the decisions that have shaped world events in recent decades, and the people who made them.

From trips on private jets and encounters with world leaders to shocking accounts of misogyny and double standards behind the scenes, this searing memoir exposes both the personal and the political fallout when unfettered power and a rotten company culture take hold. In a gripping and often absurd narrative where a few people carelessly hold the world in their hands, this eye-opening memoir reveals what really goes on among the global elite.

Sarah Wynn-Williams tells the wrenching but fun story of Facebook, mapping its rise from stumbling encounters with juntas to Mark Zuckerberg’s reaction when he learned of Facebook’s role in Trump’s election. She experiences the challenges and humiliations of working motherhood within a pressure cooker of a workplace, all while Sheryl Sandberg urges her and others to “lean in.�

Careless People is a deeply personal account of why and how things have gone so horribly wrong in the past decade—told in a sharp, candid, and utterly disarming voice. A deep, unflinching look at the role that social media has assumed in our lives, Careless People reveals the truth about the leaders of Facebook: how the more power they grasp, the less responsible they become and the consequences this has for all of us.]]> 400 Sarah Wynn-Williams 1250391237 pearl 0 to-read, nonfiction 4.33 2025 Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism
author: Sarah Wynn-Williams
name: pearl
average rating: 4.33
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/12
shelves: to-read, nonfiction
review:

]]> <![CDATA[How Big Things Get Done: The Surprising Factors That Determine the Fate of Every Project, from Home Renovations to Space Exploration and Everything In Between]]> 61327449 The secrets to successfully planning and delivering projects on any scale—from home renovation to space exploration—by the world’s leading expert on megaprojects

“This book is important, timely, instructive, and entertaining. What more could you ask for?”—Daniel Kahneman, Nobel Prize–winning author of Thinking, Fast and Slow

“Over-budget and over-schedule is an inevitability. Incompetence and grift is outrageous. Bent Flyvbjerg, with this terrific data-driven book, has shown that there is another way.”—Frank Gehry

Nothing is more inspiring than a big vision that becomes a triumphant, newreality. Think of how the Empire State Building went from a sketch to the jewel of New York’s skyline in twenty-one months, or how Apple’s iPod went from a project with a single employee to a product launch in eleven months.

These are wonderful stories. But most of the time big visions turn into nightmares. Remember Boston’s “Big Dig�? Almost every sizeable city in the world has such a fiasco in its backyard. In fact, no less than 92% of megaprojects come in over budget or over schedule, or both. The cost of California’s high-speed rail project soared from $33 billion to $100 billon—and won’t even go where promised. More modest endeavors, whether launching a small business, organizing a conference, or just finishing a work project on time, also commonly fail. Why?

Understanding what distinguishes the triumphs from the failures has been the life’s work of Oxford professor Bent Flyvbjerg, dubbed “the world’s leading megaproject expert.� In How Big Things Get Done, he identifies the errors in judgment and decision-making that lead projects, both big and small, to fail, and the research-based principles that will make you succeed with yours. For example:

� Understand your odds. If you don’t know them, you won’t win.
� Plan slow, act fast. Getting to the action quick feels right. But it’s wrong.
� Think right to left. Start with your goal, then identify the steps to get there.
� Find your Lego. Big is best built from small.
� Be a team maker. You won’t succeed without an “us.�
� Master the unknown unknowns. Most think they can’t, so they fail. Flyvbjerg shows how you can.
� Know that your biggest risk is you.

Full of vivid examples ranging from the building of the Sydney Opera House, to the making of the latest Pixar blockbusters, to a home renovation in Brooklyn gone awry, How Big Things Get Done reveals how to get any ambitious project done—on time and on budget.]]> 304 Bent Flyvbjerg 0593239512 pearl 4
Actually much shorter than I realized because the back half is notes, acknowledgements, etc.]]> 4.28 2023 How Big Things Get Done: The Surprising Factors That Determine the Fate of Every Project, from Home Renovations to Space Exploration and Everything In Between
author: Bent Flyvbjerg
name: pearl
average rating: 4.28
book published: 2023
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/12
date added: 2025/04/12
shelves: nonfiction, level-up, design, favorites
review:
Engaging, humorous, and helpful read. Many tales of projects gone to hell and beyond, which are fascinating and sadly relatable (humans are corrupt optimists etc.) and make great discussions over the dinner table. I highlighted so much! I wish there were more examples of successful projects, especially IT, but as Flyvbjerg goes onto say, the data does suggest that they're in the extreme minority haha. Highly recommended.

Actually much shorter than I realized because the back half is notes, acknowledgements, etc.
]]> <![CDATA[Unlearning Silence: How to Speak Your Mind, Unleash Talent, and Live More Fully]]> 150246147
Having a seat at the table doesn’t mean that your voice is actually welcome. Knowing something is wrong doesn't mean it's easy to speak up. In fact, there are incentives for many of us to stay silent. Why speak up if you know that it won’t be received well, and in fact, often makes things worse?

In Unlearning Silence , Hering explores how we’ve learned to be silent, how we’ve benefited from silence, how we’ve silenced other people—and how we might choose another way. She teaches how to recognize and unlearn unconscious patterns so we can make more intentional choices about how we want to show up in at home and at work. Only by unlearning silence can we more fully unleash talent, speak our minds, and be more complete versions of ourselves� and help other people do the same.

With compassion, clarity, and understanding, Hering guides readers through real-life examples and offers a concrete road map for doing this vital and challenging work.]]> 288 Elaine Lin Hering 0593653602 pearl 0 4.14 Unlearning Silence: How to Speak Your Mind, Unleash Talent, and Live More Fully
author: Elaine Lin Hering
name: pearl
average rating: 4.14
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/09
shelves: to-read, level-up, nonfiction, psychology, self-help
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Psychological Safety Playbook: Lead More Powerfully by Being More Human]]> 75562126
Every employee, at every level, wants to feel seen, heard, and respected. If we don't feel safe, we can't be our best selves or do our most creative work. This is why leaders must ensure psychological safety for everyone in their team. Whether you're a manager, CEO, or entrepreneur, The Psychological Safety Playbook is the guide you need to lead your team to the highest levels of performance and innovation.

The Psychological Safety Playbook invites you to explore twenty-five specific actions that will create more psychological safety in your workplace. These are all moves that every leader can adopt and practice. Each move features a description of why to try it, instructions on how to do it, and a nutshell summary. You can start anywhere in the playbook—all the plays and moves are self-contained!

Written by Karolin Helbig, a highly respected executive mindset coach with a doctorate in human genetics and extensive consulting experience, and Minette Norman, a sought-after leadership consultant with thirty years of experience in the tech sector, The Psychological Safety Playbook is the essential guide for leaders who are committed to fostering psychological safety in their teams.

In their combined years of business and applied practice, the authors have continually observed how creating a high-performing, innovative workforce starts with building a foundation of respect and shared humanity. When we hold back our true thoughts because we're afraid of the consequences, everyone misses out. By contrast, when we can ask a naïve question, propose a wild idea, or share our honest emotions—that's when psychological safety fuels team performance.]]> 166 Karolin Helbig 1774583097 pearl 0 4.19 The Psychological Safety Playbook: Lead More Powerfully by Being More Human
author: Karolin Helbig
name: pearl
average rating: 4.19
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/09
shelves: to-read, level-up, nonfiction, psychology
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Black Reconstruction in America 1860-1880]]> 184612 ]]> 746 W.E.B. Du Bois 0684856573 pearl 0 4.50 1935 Black Reconstruction in America 1860-1880
author: W.E.B. Du Bois
name: pearl
average rating: 4.50
book published: 1935
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/08
shelves: to-read, history, nonfiction, race, sociology
review:

]]> The Souls of Black Folk 318742 Publication of The Souls of Black Folk was a dramatic event that helped to polarize black leaders into two groups: the more conservative followers of Washington and the more radical supporters of aggressive protest. Its influence cannot be overstated. It is essential reading for everyone interested in African-American history and the struggle for civil rights in America.]]> 288 W.E.B. Du Bois pearl 0 4.30 1903 The Souls of Black Folk
author: W.E.B. Du Bois
name: pearl
average rating: 4.30
book published: 1903
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/08
shelves: to-read, nonfiction, race, sociology
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Dying of Whiteness: How the Politics of Racial Resentment Is Killing America's Heartland]]> 40697553
In the era of Donald Trump, many lower- and middle-class white Americans are drawn to politicians who pledge to make their lives great again. But as Dying of Whiteness shows, the policies that result actually place white Americans at ever-greater risk of sickness and death.

Physician Jonathan M. Metzl's quest to understand the health implications of "backlash governance" leads him across America's heartland. Interviewing a range of everyday Americans, he examines how racial resentment has fueled pro-gun laws in Missouri, resistance to the Affordable Care Act in Tennessee, and cuts to schools and social services in Kansas. And he shows these policies' costs: increasing deaths by gun suicide, rising dropout rates, and falling life expectancies. White Americans, Metzl argues, must reject the racial hierarchies that promise to aid them but in fact lead our nation to demise.]]> 341 Jonathan M. Metzl 1541644980 pearl 0 4.10 2019 Dying of Whiteness: How the Politics of Racial Resentment Is Killing America's Heartland
author: Jonathan M. Metzl
name: pearl
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/07
shelves: to-read, nonfiction, sociology, race
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Elric of Melniboné (The Elric Saga, #1)]]> 30036
The youthful Elric is a cynical and melancholy king, heir to a nation whose 100,000-year rule of the world ended less than 500 years hence. More interested in brooding contemplation than holding the throne, Elric is a reluctant ruler, but he also realizes that no other worthy successor exists and the survival of his once-powerful, decadent nation depends on him alone. Elric's nefarious, brutish cousin Yrkoon has no patience for his physically weak kinsman, and he plots constantly to seize Elric's throne, usually over his dead body. Elric of Melniboné follows Yrkoon's scheming, reaching its climax in a battle between Elric and Yrkoon with the demonic runeblades Stormbringer and Mournblade. In this battle, Elric gains control of the soul-stealing Stormbringer, an event that proves pivotal to the Elric saga. --Paul Hughes]]> 181 Michael Moorcock 0441203981 pearl 0 3.90 1972 Elric of Melniboné (The Elric Saga, #1)
author: Michael Moorcock
name: pearl
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1972
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, science-fiction, fantasy
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Darkchild (Sunscroll Stones, #1)]]> 6533014
Khira was a barohna's daughter destined to wield the power of the sun over her peaceful people. Her way was hard, but she knew her heritage and her future...

Then, in the dead of winter, a ship brought Darkchild. He was not of her race, he had no memory. How could he pose the threat to her people that the Arnimi assured her he did?

Was Darkchild all that he seemed?




1st edition Penguin 1984 paperback, vg++ In stock shipped from our UK warehouse]]> 256 Sydney J. van Scyoc 0140068643 pearl 0 3.75 1982 Darkchild (Sunscroll Stones, #1)
author: Sydney J. van Scyoc
name: pearl
average rating: 3.75
book published: 1982
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, science-fiction, fantasy
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Crystal Gryphon (Witch World Series 2: High Hallack Cycle, #5)]]> 462379 250 Andre Norton 0812547381 pearl 0 4.09 1972 The Crystal Gryphon (Witch World Series 2: High Hallack Cycle, #5)
author: Andre Norton
name: pearl
average rating: 4.09
book published: 1972
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, fantasy, science-fiction
review:

]]> Bloodstone 715276 303 Karl Edward Wagner 0446306290 pearl 0 4.12 1975 Bloodstone
author: Karl Edward Wagner
name: pearl
average rating: 4.12
book published: 1975
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, science-fiction, fantasy
review:

]]> Babette's Feast 45319987 45 Isak Dinesen 8832579200 pearl 0 4.43 1958 Babette's Feast
author: Isak Dinesen
name: pearl
average rating: 4.43
book published: 1958
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, short-stories, literary-fiction
review:

]]> The Sacred Art of Stealing 289171
The press tend to talk about bank robberies as being daring, ingenious and audacious. They don’t describe many as Dadaist, even the ones who know what ‘Dadaist� means. But how else does one explain choreographed dancing gunmen in Buchanan Street, or the surreal methods they use to stay one step ahead of the cops?

Angelique de Xavia is no art critic, but she is a connoisseur of crooks, and she’s sure that the heist she got caught up in wasn’t the work of the usual sawn-offs-and-black-tights practitioners indigenous to the parish. She knows she’s dealing with a unique species of thief, and it’s her job to hunt him to extinction � though the fact that it’s not just his m.o. that’s cute might prove a distraction.

This thief, however, has greater concerns than his own safety, and a secret agenda more valuable than anything he might steal. He can afford to play cat and mouse with the female cop who’s on his tail; it might even arguably be necessary. What he can’t afford to do is to let her get too close; he could end up in jail, which holds terrors enough; but even more scary, he could end up in love.

Honesty is a virtue. Deceit is a talent. Theft is an art form.

The Sacred Art Of Stealing: prepare to be misled.]]> 410 Christopher Brookmyre 0349114900 pearl 0 to-read, mystery, humor 4.31 2002 The Sacred Art of Stealing
author: Christopher Brookmyre
name: pearl
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2002
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, mystery, humor
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Razor's Edge (Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics)]]> 117834 314 W. Somerset Maugham 0140185232 pearl 0 to-read, literary-fiction 4.16 1944 The Razor's Edge (Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics)
author: W. Somerset Maugham
name: pearl
average rating: 4.16
book published: 1944
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, literary-fiction
review:

]]> Escape from Freedom 25491 Escape from Freedom, a landmark work by one of the most distinguished thinkers of our time, and a book that is as timely now as when first published in 1941. Few books have thrown such light upon the forces that shape modern society or penetrated so deeply into the causes of authoritarian systems. If the rise of democracy set some people free, at the same time it gave birth to a society in which the individual feels alienated and dehumanized. Using the insights of psychoanalysis as probing agents, Fromm's work analyzes the illness of contemporary civilization as witnessed by its willingness to submit to totalitarian rule.]]> 301 Erich Fromm 0805031499 pearl 0 4.29 1941 Escape from Freedom
author: Erich Fromm
name: pearl
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1941
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, psychology, philosophy, sociology
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Financier (Trilogy of Desire, #1)]]> 381364 9780452008250

A master of literary naturalism, Dreiser is known for his great intensity and keen journalistic eye as he examines real-life subjects. This powerful novel explores the dynamics of the financial world during the Civil War and after the stock-market panic caused by the Great Chicago Fire.

The first in a ''trilogy of desire,'' The Financier tells the story of the ruthlessly dominating broker Frank Cowperwood as he climbs the ladder of success, his adoring mistress championing his every move. Based on the life of financier C. T. Yerkes, Dreiser's cutting portrayal of the corrupt magnate Cowperwood illustrates the idea that wealth is often obtained by less than reputable means.]]> 460 Theodore Dreiser pearl 0 4.27 1912 The Financier (Trilogy of Desire, #1)
author: Theodore Dreiser
name: pearl
average rating: 4.27
book published: 1912
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, everything-is-shitty, literary-fiction, realism
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Elements of Style [Illustrated]]]> 453553 The Elements of Style. The book’s mantra, make every word tell, is still on point. This much-loved classic, now in its fourth edition, will forever be the go-to guide when in need of a hint to make a turn of phrase clearer or a reminder on how to enliven prose with the active voice. The only style manual to ever appear on bestseller lists has explained to millions of readers the basic principals of plain English, and Maira Kalman’s fifty-seven exquisite illustrations give the revered work a jolt of new energy, making the learning experience more colorful and clear.
--back cover]]> 147 William Strunk Jr. 0143112724 pearl 0 to-read, on-writing 4.35 1918 The Elements of Style [Illustrated]
author: William Strunk Jr.
name: pearl
average rating: 4.35
book published: 1918
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, on-writing
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Building Great Sentences: How to Write the Kinds of Sentences You Love to Read]]> 16171217 Building Great Sentences celebrates the sheer joy of language—and will forever change the way you read and write.

Great writing begins with the sentence. Whether it’s two words (“Jesus wept.�) or William Faulkner’s 1,287-word sentence in Absalom! Absalom!, sentences have the power to captivate, entertain, motivate, educate, and, most importantly, delight. Yet, the sentence-oriented approach to writing is too often overlooked in favor of bland economy. Building Great Sentences teaches you to write better sentences by luxuriating in the pleasures of language.

Award-winning Professor Brooks Landon draws on examples from masters of long, elegant sentences—including Don DeLillo, Virginia Woolf, Joan Didion, and Samuel Johnson—to reveal the mechanics of how language works on thoughts and emotions, providing the tools to write powerful, more effective sentences.]]> 288 Brooks Landon 0452298601 pearl 0 to-read, on-writing, language 4.00 2013 Building Great Sentences: How to Write the Kinds of Sentences You Love to Read
author: Brooks Landon
name: pearl
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2013
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, on-writing, language
review:

]]> Henry Miller on Writing 245 217 Henry Miller 0811201120 pearl 0 to-read, on-writing 4.23 1964 Henry Miller on Writing
author: Henry Miller
name: pearl
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1964
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, on-writing
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Delusions Of Crowds: Why People Go Mad in Groups]]> 56240358
“We are the apes who tell stories,� writes William Bernstein. “And no matter how misleading the narrative, if it is compelling enough it will nearly always trump the facts.� As Bernstein shows in his eloquent and persuasive new book, The Delusions of Crowds, throughout human history compelling stories have catalyzed the spread of contagious narratives through susceptible groups―with enormous, often disastrous, consequences.

Inspired by Charles Mackay’s 19th-century classic Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, Bernstein engages with mass delusion with the same curiosity and passion, but armed with the latest scientific research that explains the biological, evolutionary, and psychosocial roots of human irrationality. Bernstein tells the stories of dramatic religious and financial mania in western society over the last 500 years―from the Anabaptist Madness that afflicted the Low Countries in the 1530s to the dangerous End-Times beliefs that animate ISIS and pervade today’s polarized America; and from the South Sea Bubble to the Enron scandal and dot com bubbles of recent years. Through Bernstein’s supple prose, the participants are as colorful as their motivation, invariably “the desire to improve one’s well-being in this life or the next.�

As revealing about human nature as they are historically significant, Bernstein’s chronicles reveal the huge cost and alarming implications of mass mania: for example, belief in dispensationalist End-Times has over decades profoundly affected U.S. Middle East policy. Bernstein observes that if we can absorb the history and biology of mass delusion, we can recognize it more readily in our own time, and avoid its frequently dire impact.]]> 576 William J. Bernstein 161185444X pearl 0 3.50 2021 The Delusions Of Crowds: Why People Go Mad in Groups
author: William J. Bernstein
name: pearl
average rating: 3.50
book published: 2021
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, everything-is-shitty, history, nonfiction, sociology
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Determined: A Science of Life without Free Will]]> 83817782 One of our great behavioral scientists, the bestselling author of Behave, plumbs the depths of the science and philosophy of decision-making to mount a devastating case against free will, an argument with profound consequences.

Robert Sapolsky's Behave, his now classic account of why humans do good and why they do bad, pointed toward an unsettling conclusion: we may not grasp the precise marriage of nature and nurture that creates the physics and chemistry at base of human behavior, but that doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Now, in Determined, Sapolsky takes his argument all the way, mounting a brilliant (and in his inimitable way, delightful) full-frontal assault on the pleasant fantasy that there's some separate self telling our biology what to do.

Determined offers a marvelous synthesis of what we know about how consciousness works--the tight weave between reason and emotion, and between stimulus and response, in the moment and over a life. One by one, Sapolsky tackles all the major arguments for free will and takes them out, cutting a path through the thickets of chaos and complexity science and quantum physics, as well as touching ground on some of the wilder shores of philosophy. He shows us that the history of medicine is in no small part the history of learning that fewer and fewer things are somebody's "fault"; for example, for centuries we thought seizures were a sign of demonic possession. Yet as he acknowledges, it's very hard, and at times impossible, to uncouple from our zeal to judge others, and to judge ourselves. Sapolsky applies the new understanding of life beyond free will to some of our most essential questions around punishment, morality, and living well together. By the end, Sapolsky argues that while living our daily lives recognizing that we have no free will is going to be monumentally difficult, doing so is not going to result in anarchy, pointlessness and existential malaise. Instead, it will make for a much more humane world.]]> 528 Robert M. Sapolsky 0525560971 pearl 0 4.22 2023 Determined: A Science of Life without Free Will
author: Robert M. Sapolsky
name: pearl
average rating: 4.22
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
shelves: to-read, psychology, nonfiction
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Harpy's Flight (Windsingers, #1)]]> 401427 320 Megan Lindholm 0007112521 pearl 0 fantasy, currently-reading 3.65 1983 Harpy's Flight (Windsingers, #1)
author: Megan Lindholm
name: pearl
average rating: 3.65
book published: 1983
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/04
shelves: fantasy, currently-reading
review:

]]> Against Nature: The Notebooks 23258421 Against Nature, a companion volume to Espedal's earlier Against Art, is an examination of factory work, love’s labor, and the work of writing. Espedal dwells on the notion that working is required in order to live in compliance with society, but is this natural? And how can it be natural when he is drawn toward impossible things—impossible love, books, myths, and taboos? He is drawn into the stories of Abélard and Héloïse, of young Marguerite Duras and her Chinese lover, and soon realizes that he, too, is turning into a person who must choose to live against nature.
“A masterpiece of literary understatement. Everybody who has recently been thirsting for a new, unexhausted realism, like water in the desert, will love this book.”�Die Zeit, on the Norwegian edition]]> 192 Tomas Espedal 0857422359 pearl 0 to-read, literary-fiction 4.07 2011 Against Nature: The Notebooks
author: Tomas Espedal
name: pearl
average rating: 4.07
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/01
shelves: to-read, literary-fiction
review:

]]> Brioche (Gaspard Et Lisa) 14657214 32 Anne Gutman 201225974X pearl 0 5.00 2008 Brioche (Gaspard Et Lisa)
author: Anne Gutman
name: pearl
average rating: 5.00
book published: 2008
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/31
shelves: to-read, animal-heroes, picture-book, fraaance
review:

]]> When Darkness Loves Us 44426218
During a terrifying storm, a gentle childhood is destroyed by a twisted man who promises love but delivers nightmare.

In the lightless depths of an underground labyrinth, unseen creatures lie in wait for an innocent traveler, cold skeletal hands stretched out in welcome.

There is horror in darkness--horror made greater When Darkness Loves Us.

This long-awaited reissue of Elizabeth Engstrom's 1985 horror classic features a new introduction by Paperbacks from Hell author Grady Hendrix as well as the original foreword by SF legend Theodore Sturgeon and the original cover painting by Jill Bauman.]]> 152 Elizabeth Engstrom pearl 2 The first story was actually very funny in its matter-of-factness about everything and I enjoyed the descriptions of the underworld. Wish it had gone farther in its worldbuilding and creepiness. There was a great deal of time spent on "the aftermath of the return" which I thought was soap opera-like.

The second story was just very sad, dismal, and not scary at all.]]> 3.89 1985 When Darkness Loves Us
author: Elizabeth Engstrom
name: pearl
average rating: 3.89
book published: 1985
rating: 2
read at: 2025/03/30
date added: 2025/03/30
shelves: scary, everything-is-shitty, not-what-i-expected, fantasy, being-a-woman
review:
Not what I expected.
The first story was actually very funny in its matter-of-factness about everything and I enjoyed the descriptions of the underworld. Wish it had gone farther in its worldbuilding and creepiness. There was a great deal of time spent on "the aftermath of the return" which I thought was soap opera-like.

The second story was just very sad, dismal, and not scary at all.
]]> <![CDATA[My Life Had Stood a Loaded Gun (Penguin Little Black Classics, #114)]]> 29354537 52 Emily Dickinson pearl 0 to-read, poetry 3.88 1880 My Life Had Stood a Loaded Gun (Penguin Little Black Classics, #114)
author: Emily Dickinson
name: pearl
average rating: 3.88
book published: 1880
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/30
shelves: to-read, poetry
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Nervous Breakdown (Penguin Little Black Classics, #111)]]> 28385946 'I did have hallucinations, but did they harm anyone? Who did they harm, that's what I'd like to know!']]> 112 Anton Chekhov pearl 0 3.74 1895 A Nervous Breakdown (Penguin Little Black Classics, #111)
author: Anton Chekhov
name: pearl
average rating: 3.74
book published: 1895
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/30
shelves: to-read, russia, short-stories, literary-fiction
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Night is Darkening Round Me]]> 24874353
Some of Emily Brontë's most extraordinary poems

Introducing Little Black Classics: 80 books for Penguin's 80th birthday. Little Black Classics celebrate the huge range and diversity of Penguin Classics, with books from around the world and across many centuries. They take us from a balloon ride over Victorian London to a garden of blossom in Japan, from Tierra del Fuego to 16th century California and the Russian steppe. Here are stories lyrical and savage; poems epic and intimate; essays satirical and inspirational; and ideas that have shaped the lives of millions.

Emily Brontë (1818-1848).

Brontë's Wuthering Heights and The Complete Poems are available in Penguin Classics]]> 55 Emily Brontë 0141398477 pearl 0 to-read, poetry 3.86 1846 The Night is Darkening Round Me
author: Emily Brontë
name: pearl
average rating: 3.86
book published: 1846
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/30
shelves: to-read, poetry
review:

]]> <![CDATA[One Day I Will Write about This Place]]> 15956623 Binyavanga Wainaina tumbled through his middle-class Kenyan childhood out of kilter with the world around him. This world came to him as a chaos of loud and colorful sounds: the hair dryers at his mother's beauty parlor, black mamba bicycle bells, mechanics in Nairobi, the music of Michael Jackson--all punctuated by the infectious laughter of his brother and sister, Jimmy and Ciru. He could fall in with their patterns, but it would take him a while to carve out his own.
In this vivid and compelling debut memoir, Wainaina takes us through his school days, his mother's religious period, his failed attempt to study in South Africa as a computer programmer, a moving family reunion in Uganda, and his travels around Kenya. The landscape in front of him always claims his main attention, but he also evokes the shifting political scene that unsettles his views on family, tribe, and nationhood.
Throughout, reading is his refuge and his solace. And when, in 2002, a writing prize comes through, the door is opened for him to pursue the career that perhaps had been beckoning all along. A series of fascinating international reporting assignments follow. Finally he circles back to a Kenya in the throes of postelection violence and finds he is not the only one questioning the old certainties.
Resolutely avoiding stereotype and cliche, Wainaina paints every scene in "One Day I Will Write About This Place "with a highly distinctive and hugely memorable brush.]]> 272 Binyavanga Wainaina 1847083323 pearl 0 to-read, autobiography 4.02 2011 One Day I Will Write about This Place
author: Binyavanga Wainaina
name: pearl
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/26
shelves: to-read, autobiography
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Designing Programmes: Programme as Typeface, Typography, Picture, Method]]> 39659831 120 Karl Gerstner 3037785780 pearl 0 4.22 Designing Programmes: Programme as Typeface, Typography, Picture, Method
author: Karl Gerstner
name: pearl
average rating: 4.22
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/26
shelves: design, level-up, philosophy, to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[LAYOUT NOW: The Arrangement of Text&Graphics]]> 40197926 256 SendPoints 9887757357 pearl 0 4.00 LAYOUT NOW: The Arrangement of Text&Graphics
author: SendPoints
name: pearl
average rating: 4.00
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/26
shelves: design, level-up, nonfiction, to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die]]> 69242 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - The instant classic about why some ideas thrive, why others die, and how to improve your idea's chances--essential reading in the "fake news" era.

Mark Twain once observed, "A lie can get halfway around the world before the truth can even get its boots on." His observation rings true: Urban legends, conspiracy theories, and bogus news stories circulate effortlessly. Meanwhile, people with important ideas--entrepreneurs, teachers, politicians, and journalists--struggle to make them "stick."

In Made to Stick, Chip and Dan Heath reveal the anatomy of ideas that stick and explain ways to make ideas stickier, such as applying the human scale principle, using the Velcro Theory of Memory, and creating curiosity gaps. Along the way, we discover that sticky messages of all kinds--from the infamous "kidney theft ring" hoax to a coach's lessons on sportsmanship to a vision for a new product at Sony--draw their power from the same six traits.

Made to Stick will transform the way you communicate. It's a fast-paced tour of success stories (and failures): the Nobel Prize-winning scientist who drank a glass of bacteria to prove a point about stomach ulcers; the charities who make use of the Mother Teresa Effect; the elementary-school teacher whose simulation actually prevented racial prejudice.

Provocative, eye-opening, and often surprisingly funny, Made to Stick shows us the vital principles of winning ideas--and tells us how we can apply these rules to making our own messages stick.]]> 291 Chip Heath 1400064287 pearl 0 3.98 2006 Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die
author: Chip Heath
name: pearl
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/26
shelves: nonfiction, level-up, psychology, design, to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Grid systems in graphic design: A visual communication manual for graphic designers, typographers and three dimensional designers]]> 60664913 Josef Müller-Brockmann pearl 5 4.31 1996 Grid systems in graphic design: A visual communication manual for graphic designers, typographers and three dimensional designers
author: Josef Müller-Brockmann
name: pearl
average rating: 4.31
book published: 1996
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/26
date added: 2025/03/26
shelves: design, level-up, nonfiction, philosophy, favorites
review:
Extremely good, clear, crisp, and refreshing like tasting an Asian pear for the first time.
]]> Alien Clay 195443798
On the distant world of Kiln lie the ruins of an alien civilization. It’s the greatest discovery in humanity’s spacefaring history � yet who were its builders and where did they go?

Professor Arton Daghdev had always wanted to study alien life up close. Then his wishes become a reality in the worst way. His political activism sees him exiled from Earth to Kiln’s extrasolar labour camp. There, he’s condemned to work under an alien sky until he dies.

Kiln boasts a ravenous, chaotic ecosystem like nothing seen on Earth. The monstrous alien life interacts in surprising, sometimes shocking ways with the human body, so Arton will risk death on a daily basis. However, the camp’s oppressive regime might just kill him first. If Arton can somehow escape both fates, the world of Kiln holds a wondrous, terrible secret. It will redefine life and intelligence as he knows it, and might just set him free . . .]]> 396 Adrian Tchaikovsky 1035013770 pearl 0 3.98 2024 Alien Clay
author: Adrian Tchaikovsky
name: pearl
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/26
shelves: science-fiction, everything-is-shitty, abandoned
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of a Donner Party Bride]]> 6033525
In this gripping narrative, Daniel James Brown sheds new light on one of the most infamous events in American history. Following every painful footstep of Sarah's journey with the Donner Party, Brown produces a tale both spellbinding and richly informative.]]> 352 Daniel James Brown 0061348104 pearl 4
The book has a TON of filler in the second half due to pages-long explanations and examples about the scientific context of suffering lol. It's not necessary, at least not most of it! And the epilogue is a drag and a bit cheeseball. Still... the story, the story!

What a ride.]]> 4.24 2009 The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of a Donner Party Bride
author: Daniel James Brown
name: pearl
average rating: 4.24
book published: 2009
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/26
date added: 2025/03/26
shelves: history, nonfiction, everything-is-shitty, being-a-woman, family-drama, scary, favorites
review:
Had a great (??) time with this book which was as harrowing as you can expect but not because of the cannibalism--everything leading UP to those moments is absolutely dreadful and fascinating and immersive.

The book has a TON of filler in the second half due to pages-long explanations and examples about the scientific context of suffering lol. It's not necessary, at least not most of it! And the epilogue is a drag and a bit cheeseball. Still... the story, the story!

What a ride.
]]> More Than Human 541024
In this genre-bending novel - among the first to have launched scifi into the arena of literature - one of the great imaginers of the twentieth century tells a story as mind-blowing as any controlled substance and as affecting as a glimpse into a stranger's soul. For as the protagonists of More Than Human struggle to find who they are and whether they are meant to help humanity or destroy it. Theodore Sturgeon explores questions of power and morality, individuality and belonging, with suspense, pathos, and a lyricism rarely seen in science fiction.]]> 186 Theodore Sturgeon 0375703713 pearl 4 3.95 1953 More Than Human
author: Theodore Sturgeon
name: pearl
average rating: 3.95
book published: 1953
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/22
date added: 2025/03/22
shelves:
review:
Wild and compulsively readable. Unfortunately I didn't like the ending - the entire last third dragged for me - but I won't forget this story. I Ioved the concept (a precursor to Akira basically) and Sturgeon's writing style feels like a long lost friend. I want to read more of his stuff!
]]> Forerunner Foray 1026543 286 Andre Norton 0670323578 pearl 0 3.90 1973 Forerunner Foray
author: Andre Norton
name: pearl
average rating: 3.90
book published: 1973
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/20
shelves: to-read, science-fiction, fantasy
review:
Wanna read this simply because of the cover art by Charles Mikolaycak.
]]> Orpheus 1148712 27 Charles Mikolaycak 0152588043 pearl 0 4.27 1992 Orpheus
author: Charles Mikolaycak
name: pearl
average rating: 4.27
book published: 1992
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/20
shelves: to-read, retellings, picture-book, mythology
review:

]]> The White Guard 229733 The Master and Margarita, The White Guard is still an engrossing book, though completely different in tone. It is set in Kiev during the Russian revolution and tells the story of the Turbin family and the war's effect on the middle-classes (not workers).

The story was not seen as politically correct, and thereby contributed to Bulgakov's lifelong troubles with the Soviet authorities. It was, however, a well-loved book, and the novel was turned into a successful play at the time of its publication in 1967.]]> 304 Mikhail Bulgakov 0099490668 pearl 0 4.04 1924 The White Guard
author: Mikhail Bulgakov
name: pearl
average rating: 4.04
book published: 1924
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/17
shelves: to-read, historical-fiction, russia
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Keep Going: 10 Ways to Stay Creative in Good Times and Bad (Austin Kleon)]]> 40591677
In his previous books Steal Like an Artist and Show Your Work! , both New York Times bestsellers, Austin Kleon gave readers the keys to unlock their creativity and showed them how to become known. Now he offers his most inspiring work yet, with ten simple rules for how to stay creative, focused, and true to yourself—for life.

The creative life is not a linear journey to a finish line, it’s a loop—so find a daily routine, because today is the only day that matters. Disconnect from the world to connect with yourself—sometimes you just have to switch into airplane mode. Keep Going celebrates getting outdoors and taking a walk (as director Ingmar Bergman told his daughter, ”The demons hate fresh air�). Pay attention, and especially pay attention to what you pay attention to. Worry less about getting things done, and more about the worth of what you’re doing. Instead of focusing on making your mark, work to leave things better than you found them.

Keep Going and its timeless, practical, and ethical principles are for anyone trying to sustain a meaningful and productive life.
]]> 224 Austin Kleon 1523506644 pearl 3 self-help 4.26 2019 Keep Going: 10 Ways to Stay Creative in Good Times and Bad (Austin Kleon)
author: Austin Kleon
name: pearl
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2019
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/17
date added: 2025/03/17
shelves: self-help
review:
Kinda bland, read in tiny increments over a few days, but it's still helpful to have these sorts of reminders.
]]> The Inhabited Island 57086283
The Inhabited Island is one of the Strugatsky brothers' most popular and acclaimed novels, yet the only previous English-language edition (Prisoners of Power) was based on a version heavily censored by Soviet authorities. Now, in a sparkling new edition by award-winning translator Andrew Bromfield, this landmark novel can be newly appreciated by both longtime Strugatsky fans and new explorers of the Russian science fiction masters' astonishingly rich body of work.]]> 416 Arkady Strugatsky 1473232449 pearl 0 3.92 1968 The Inhabited Island
author: Arkady Strugatsky
name: pearl
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1968
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/17
shelves: to-read, science-fiction, russia
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Miss D and Me: Life with the Invincible Bette Davis]]> 33784364
Miss D and Me is a story of two powerful women, one at the end of her life and the other at the beginning. As Bette Davis aged she was looking for an assistant, but she found something more than that in a loyal and loving buddy, a co-conspirator in her jokes and schemes, and a competent assistant whom she trained never to miss a detail. But Miss D had strict rules for Kathryn about everything from how to eat a salad to how to wear her hair...even the spelling of Kathryn's name was changed (adding the "y") per Miss D's request. Throughout their time together, the two grew incredibly close, and Kathryn had a front-row seat to the larger-than-life Davis's career renaissance in her later years, as well as to the humiliating public betrayal that nearly killed Miss D.

The frame of this story is a four-day road trip Kathryn and Davis took from Biarritz to Paris, during which they disentangled their ferocious dependency. Miss D and Me is a window into the world of the unique and formidable Bette Davis, told by the person who perhaps knew her best of all.]]> 288 Kathryn Sermak 0316507849 pearl 0 4.10 2017 Miss D and Me: Life with the Invincible Bette Davis
author: Kathryn Sermak
name: pearl
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/16
shelves: to-read, being-a-woman, biography, friendship
review:

]]> The Last Wolf / Herman 29082608 The Last Wolf features a classic, obsessed Krasznahorkai narrator, a man hired to write (by mistake, by a glitch of fate) the true tale of the last wolf of Extremadura, a barren stretch of Spain. This miserable experience (being mistaken for another, dragged about a cold foreign place, appalled by a species� end) is narrated� all in a single sentence—as a sad looping tale, a howl more or less, in a dreary wintry Berlin bar to a patently bored bartender.

The Last Wolf is Krasznahorkai in a maddening nutshell—with the narrator trapped in his own experience (having internalized the extermination of the last creature of its kind and � locked Extremadura in the depths of his own cold, empty, hollow heart �)—enfolding the reader in the exact same sort of entrapment to and beyond the end, with its first full-stop period of the book.

Herman, “a peerless virtuoso of trapping who guards the splendid mysteries of an ancient craft gradually sinking into permanent oblivion,� is asked to clear a forest’s last “noxious beasts.� In Herman I: The Game Warden, he begins with great zeal, although in time he “suspects that maybe he was ‘on the wrong scent.’� Herman switches sides, deciding to track entirely new game...

In Herman II: The Death of a Craft, the same situation is viewed by strange visitors to the region. Hyper-sexualized aristocratic officers on a very extended leave are enjoying a saturnalia with a bevy of beauties in the town nearest the forest. With a sense of effete irony, they interrupt their orgies to pitch in with the manhunt of poor Herman, and in the end, “only we are left to relish the magic bouquet of this escapade...”]]> 128 László Krasznahorkai 0811226085 pearl 0 4.04 2016 The Last Wolf / Herman
author: László Krasznahorkai
name: pearl
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2016
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: to-read, short-stories, hungary
review:

]]> More Than Human 55001775
In this genre-bending novel - among the first to have launched scifi into the arena of literature - one of the great imaginers of the twentieth century tells a story as mind-blowing as any controlled substance and as affecting as a glimpse into a stranger's soul. For as the protagonists of More Than Human struggle to find who they are and whether they are meant to help humanity or destroy it. Theodore Sturgeon explores questions of power and morality, individuality and belonging, with suspense, pathos, and a lyricism rarely seen in science fiction.]]> 192 Theodore Sturgeon pearl 0 to-read, science-fiction 3.99 1953 More Than Human
author: Theodore Sturgeon
name: pearl
average rating: 3.99
book published: 1953
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: to-read, science-fiction
review:

]]> The Invincible 51777669 The Invincible tells the story of a space cruiser sent to an obscure planet to determine the fate of a sister spaceship whose communication with Earth has abruptly ceased. Landing on the planet Regis III, navigator Rohan and his crew discover a form of life that has apparently evolved from autonomous, self-replicating machines--perhaps the survivors of a "robot war." Rohan and his men are forced to confront the classic quandary: what course of action can humanity take once it has reached the limits of its knowledge? In The Invincible, Lem has his characters confront the inexplicable and the bizarre: the problem that lies just beyond analytical reach.]]> 219 Stanisław Lem 0262538474 pearl 0 to-read, science-fiction 4.13 1964 The Invincible
author: Stanisław Lem
name: pearl
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1964
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: to-read, science-fiction
review:

]]> The Dragon Masters 7417196 Hugo Award winner, 1963.]]> 137 Jack Vance 0441166490 pearl 0 to-read 3.85 1962 The Dragon Masters
author: Jack Vance
name: pearl
average rating: 3.85
book published: 1962
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The Gallows Pole 45724697
They are the Cragg Vale Coiners and their business is 'clipping' � the forging of coins, a treasonous offence punishable by death. When an excise officer vows to bring them down and with the industrial age set to change the face of England forever, Hartley's empire begins to crumble.

Forensically assembled, The Gallows Pole is a true story of resistance and a rarely told alternative history of the North.]]> 370 Benjamin Myers 1526611155 pearl 0 to-read, historical-fiction 4.09 2017 The Gallows Pole
author: Benjamin Myers
name: pearl
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2017
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: to-read, historical-fiction
review:

]]> Laurus 24694092
Laurus is a remarkably rich novel about the eternal themes of love, loss, self-sacrifice and faith, from one of Russia’s most exciting and critically acclaimed novelists.]]> 365 Eugene Vodolazkin 1780747551 pearl 0 4.21 2012 Laurus
author: Eugene Vodolazkin
name: pearl
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2012
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: to-read, historical-fiction, russia
review:

]]> The Wake 21023409
In The Wake, a postapocalyptic novel set a thousand years in the past, Paul Kingsnorth brings this dire scenario back to us through the eyes of the unforgettable Buccmaster, a proud landowner bearing witness to the end of his world. Accompanied by a band of like-minded men, Buccmaster is determined to seek revenge on the invaders. But as the men travel across the scorched English landscape, Buccmaster becomes increasingly unhinged by the immensity of his loss, and their path forward becomes increasingly unclear.

Written in what the author describes as “a shadow tongue”—a version of Old English updated so as to be understandable to the modern reader�The Wake renders the inner life of an Anglo-Saxon man with an accuracy and immediacy rare in historical fiction. To enter Buccmaster’s world is to feel powerfully the sheer strangeness of the past. A tale of lost gods and haunted visions, The Wake is both a sensational, gripping story and a major literary achievement.]]> 365 Paul Kingsnorth 1908717866 pearl 0 4.05 2014 The Wake
author: Paul Kingsnorth
name: pearl
average rating: 4.05
book published: 2014
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: to-read, historical-fiction, language, fantasy, everything-is-shitty
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Last of the Wallendas and Other Poems]]> 6407633 64 Russell Hoban 0340678305 pearl 0 to-read, poetry 4.33 1998 The Last of the Wallendas and Other Poems
author: Russell Hoban
name: pearl
average rating: 4.33
book published: 1998
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: to-read, poetry
review:

]]> Riddley Walker 776573 256 Russell Hoban 0253212340 pearl 0 to-read, science-fiction 4.03 1980 Riddley Walker
author: Russell Hoban
name: pearl
average rating: 4.03
book published: 1980
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: to-read, science-fiction
review:

]]> Summer Will Show 5339558
Then tragedy the children die, and Sophia, in despair, finds her way to Paris, arriving just in time for the revolution of 1848. Before long she has formed the unlikeliest of close relations with Minna, her husband’s sometime mistress, whose dramatic recitations, based on her hair-raising childhood in czarist Russia, electrify audiences in drawing rooms and on the street alike. Minna, “magnanimous and unscrupulous, fickle, ardent, and interfering,� leads Sophia on a wild adventure through bohemian and revolutionary Paris, in a story that reaches an unforgettable conclusion amidst the bullets, bloodshed, and hope of the barricades.

Sylvia Townsend Warner was one of the most original and inventive of twentieth-century English novelists. At once an adventure story, a love story, and a novel of ideas, Summer Will Show is a brilliant reimagining of the possibilities of historical fiction.]]> 329 Sylvia Townsend Warner 1590173163 pearl 0 3.59 1936 Summer Will Show
author: Sylvia Townsend Warner
name: pearl
average rating: 3.59
book published: 1936
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: being-a-woman, historical-fiction, literary-fiction, abandoned
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Stay Sane in an Insane World: How to Control the Controllables and Thrive]]> 75405998 “What I learned from Greg is still a part of who I am today.”—Tom Brady, 7-time Super Bowl champion

Greg Harden changes lives.

This is why hundreds of world-class athletes, doctors, lawyers, teachers, business leaders, college students, and professionals from all walks of life have come to him for advice and direction—including 7-time Super Bowl Champion Tom Brady, 23-time Olympic Gold Medalist Michael Phelps, Heisman Trophy winners Desmond Howard and Charles Woodson, CEOs of major companies, and championship coaching staffs from all over the world.

Harden teaches his students how to practice, train, and rehearse to give 100 percent, 100 percent of the time, and challenges them by If you don’t believe in yourself, why should I believe in you?

Champions aren’t born. They’re built. Greg Harden spent over 30 years building them at the University of Michigan, including 400 future professional athletes, 50 NFL first-round draft picks, and 120 Olympians from over 20 countries. He gained national recognition when 60 Minutes Sports profiled him as “Michigan’s Secret Weapon.�

Now, in his first book, Greg Harden is reaching out to help anyone who wants to live their best life by offering powerful and practical advice.

You will learn

Stop being afraid of being Fear and self-doubt are the enemy. As soon as you learn that fear and self-doubt are predictable, they become manageable. Control the How you control your own emotions, reactions, and responses to circumstances is what you must master first. You are the only one who has control over your mind. Stop letting others determine the way you feel about yourself. Commit, improve, and Learn to build better habits. Making small improvements every day is the secret to a completely transformed life. Become the world’s greatest expert on It’s the only way to become the very best version of yourself. Practice self-love and These are the keys to eliminating and replacing self-defeating attitudes and behaviors. This is a one-of-a-kind book that will give you the indispensable lessons and tools necessary to create real change in your life.

PLEASE When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.]]> 210 Greg Harden 1665092416 pearl 0 4.18 2023 Stay Sane in an Insane World: How to Control the Controllables and Thrive
author: Greg Harden
name: pearl
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/12
shelves: nonfiction, level-up, self-help, abandoned
review:

]]> <![CDATA[REMARKABLE GRAPHIC STYLES � CHAOTIC]]> 43668821 224 SendPoints 9887849464 pearl 0 to-read, design 5.00 REMARKABLE GRAPHIC STYLES ― CHAOTIC
author: SendPoints
name: pearl
average rating: 5.00
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/09
shelves: to-read, design
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Typography Now: The Design and Application of Type]]> 52633106 256 SendPoints 9887928399 pearl 0 to-read, design, level-up 5.00 Typography Now: The Design and Application of Type
author: SendPoints
name: pearl
average rating: 5.00
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/09
shelves: to-read, design, level-up
review:

]]> Re-Imagine Bizarre Type 63258043 412 SendPoints 9887608742 pearl 0 to-read, design, level-up 4.50 Re-Imagine Bizarre Type
author: SendPoints
name: pearl
average rating: 4.50
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/09
shelves: to-read, design, level-up
review:

]]> Japanese Layout Design 111322490 221 SendPoints 9887608785 pearl 4 3.70 Japanese Layout Design
author: SendPoints
name: pearl
average rating: 3.70
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2025/03/09
date added: 2025/03/09
shelves: design, japan, level-up, favorites, nonfiction
review:
Clear, approachable, and convenient reference for contemporary Japanese layout design in posters, books covers, advertising, etc. Been referring to it for days and it has a permanent place on my shelf.
]]> <![CDATA[The Mercy of Gods (The Captive’s War #1)]]> 201930181
Caught up in academic intrigue and affairs of the heart, Dafyd Alkhor is pleased just to be an assistant to a brilliant scientist and his celebrated research team. Then the Carryx ships descend, decimating the human population and taking the best and brightest of Anjiin society away to serve on the Carryx homeworld, and Dafyd is swept along with them. They are dropped in the middle of a struggle they barely understand, set in a competition against the other captive species with extinction as the price of failure.

Only Dafyd and a handful of his companions see past the Darwinian contest to the deeper game that they must play to learning to understand � and manipulate � the Carryx themselves. With a noble but suicidal human rebellion on one hand and strange and murderous enemies on the other, the team pays a terrible price to become the trusted servants of their new rulers. Dafyd Alkhor is a simple man swept up in events that are beyond his control and more vast than his imagination. He will become the champion of humanity and its betrayer, the most hated man in history and the guardian of his people. This is where his story begins.]]> 422 James S.A. Corey 031652557X pearl 3
Oh and: Justice for the Night Drinkers.]]> 4.11 2024 The Mercy of Gods (The Captive’s War #1)
author: James S.A. Corey
name: pearl
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/09
date added: 2025/03/09
shelves: science-fiction, everything-is-shitty
review:
Thought this was going to be cooler than it was, but it was still a page-turner. The human characters were mostly forgettable, annoying, or, worse, exhausting-- don't get me started on Jessyn whose chapters I dreaded! This was redeemed by hints of more fun and exciting worldbuilding later on. Crumbs, but I'm looking forward to book 2.

Oh and: Justice for the Night Drinkers.
]]> Shadowdance 911867 537 Robin Wayne Bailey 1565049462 pearl 0 3.62 1991 Shadowdance
author: Robin Wayne Bailey
name: pearl
average rating: 3.62
book published: 1991
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/28
shelves: to-read, everything-is-shitty, fantasy, queer
review:

]]> <![CDATA[It Lasts Forever And Then It's Over]]> 206773193
The heroine of this haunting, spare novel is voraciously alive in the afterlife. Adrift yet keenly aware, our undead narrator notes every bizarre detail of her new reality. She has forgotten even her name, but she remembers with unbearable longing the place where she knew herself and was known � where she loved and was loved. She heads west and into mind-boggling adventures, carrying a dead but laconically opinionated crow in her chest. The joint winner of The Novel Prize, It Lasts Forever and Then It’s Over is a sharp and funny tale for our dispossessed times.]]> 128 Anne de Marcken 1923106007 pearl 0 3.61 2024 It Lasts Forever And Then It's Over
author: Anne de Marcken
name: pearl
average rating: 3.61
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/25
shelves: to-read, literary-fiction, fantasy, science-fiction
review:

]]> Selected Poetry 7119116 About the Series: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the broadest spectrum of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, voluminous notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.]]> 224 Samuel Taylor Coleridge 0199555826 pearl 0 to-read, poetry 3.37 1902 Selected Poetry
author: Samuel Taylor Coleridge
name: pearl
average rating: 3.37
book published: 1902
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/25
shelves: to-read, poetry
review:

]]> Christabel 13627235
The story of Christabel concerns a central female character of the same name and her encounter with a stranger called Geraldine, who claims to have been abducted from her home by a band of rough men. Christabel pities her and takes her home with her; supernatural signs seem to indicate that not all is well.]]> 20 Samuel Taylor Coleridge pearl 0 3.84 1816 Christabel
author: Samuel Taylor Coleridge
name: pearl
average rating: 3.84
book published: 1816
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/25
shelves: to-read, poetry, girl-you-crazy, queer
review:

]]> <![CDATA[To Overthrow the World: The Rise and Fall and Rise of Communism]]> 204593674 From an award-winning historian, a new global history of Communism When the USSR collapsed in 1991, the world was certain that Communism was dead. Today, three decades later, it is clear that it was not. While Russia may no longer be Communist, Communism and sympathy for Communist ideas have proliferated across the globe. In To Overthrow the World, Sean McMeekin investigates the evolution of Communism from a seductive ideal of a classless society into the ruling doctrine of tyrannical regimes. Tracing Communism’s ascent from theory to practice, McMeekin ranges from Karl Marx’s writings to the rise and fall of the USSR under Stalin to Mao’s rise to power in China to the acceleration of Communist or Communist-inspired policies around the world in the twenty-first century. McMeekin argues, however, that despite the endurance of Communism, it remains deeply unpopular as a political form. Where it has arisen, it has always arisen by force. Blending historical narrative with cutting-edge scholarship, To Overthrow the World revolutionizes our understanding of the evolution of Communism—an idea that seemingly cannot die.]]> 544 Sean McMeekin 1541601963 pearl 0 4.06 2024 To Overthrow the World: The Rise and Fall and Rise of Communism
author: Sean McMeekin
name: pearl
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/25
shelves: to-read, history, russia, china, nonfiction, philosophy
review:

]]> Bitterthorn 61688564
Mina, daughter of the duke, is grieving and lonely. She has lost all hope of any future for herself in Blumwald. So when the Witch demands her next companion, Mina offers herself up � though she has no idea what fate awaits her. Stranded with her darkly alluring captor, the mystery of what happened to the previous companions draws Mina into the heart of a terrifying secret that could save her life, or end it.]]> 368 Kat Dunn 1839132957 pearl 0 to-read, fantasy, queer 3.89 2023 Bitterthorn
author: Kat Dunn
name: pearl
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2023
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/23
shelves: to-read, fantasy, queer
review:

]]> Hungerstone 212342605 Hungerstoneis a thrillingly seductive sapphic romance for fans of S.T. Gibson’sA Dowry of Bloodand Emilia Hart’sWeyward.

For what do you hunger, Lenore?

Lenore is the wife of steel magnate Henry, but ten years into their marriage, the relationship has soured and no child has arrived to fill the distance growing between them. Henry's ambitions take them out of London and to the imposing Nethershaw manor in the countryside, where Henry aims to host a hunt with society’s finest. Lenore keeps a terrible secret from the last time her husband hunted, and though they never speak of it, it haunts their marriage to this day.

The preparations for the event take a turn when a carriage accident near their remote home brings the mysterious Carmilla into Lenore's life. Carmilla who is weak and pale during the day but vibrant at night; Carmilla who stirs up a hunger deep within Lenore. Soon girls from local villages begin to fall sick before being consumed by a bloody hunger.

Torn between regaining her husband's affection and Carmilla's ever-growing presence, Lenore begins to unravel her past and in doing so, uncovers a darkness in her household that will place her at terrible risk . . .

Set against the violent wilderness of the moors and the uncontrolled appetite of the industrial revolution,Hungerstoneis a compulsive feminist reworking ofCarmilla, the book that inspiredDracula: a captivating story of appetite and desire.]]> 336 Kat Dunn 1638932166 pearl 0 4.02 2025 Hungerstone
author: Kat Dunn
name: pearl
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/23
shelves: to-read, being-a-woman, fantasy, queer, retellings
review:

]]> Lycanthia 38750476 312 Frances Layland-Barratt pearl 0 4.00 Lycanthia
author: Frances Layland-Barratt
name: pearl
average rating: 4.00
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/23
shelves: to-read, fantasy, rare-as-hell
review:

]]> Snail (Abacus Books) 8617566 256 Richard Miller 0349123276 pearl 0 to-read, dreamlike, fantasy 3.17 1984 Snail (Abacus Books)
author: Richard Miller
name: pearl
average rating: 3.17
book published: 1984
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/23
shelves: to-read, dreamlike, fantasy
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Life of High Countess Gritta von Ratsinourhouse (European Women Writers)]]> 1838774


Their community is sustained by the industry and talents of each of the girls. Mayeli paints, Harmony composes, and Wildberry, an herbalist, learns nature’s secrets and gains access to supernatural powers that will guarantee the future of the community. Gritta chooses to marry Prince Bonus of Sumbona, but when she sees the twelve cells in the cloister, she realizes with a pang of longing that she will never occupy the one meant for her.



This enchanting tale, coauthored in the early 1840s by Gisela von Arnim Grimm and her mother, Bettine von Arnim, lay undiscovered in an archive for nearly a century. Through humor and delicate satire, the authors criticize the place of women and children in nineteenth-century German society.]]> 196 Bettina von Arnim 0803296207 pearl 0 3.68 1845 The Life of High Countess Gritta von Ratsinourhouse (European Women Writers)
author: Bettina von Arnim
name: pearl
average rating: 3.68
book published: 1845
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/23
shelves: to-read, girlhood, adventure, fantasy
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Grovelling and Other Vices: The Sociology of Sycophancy]]> 2843266 200 Alphons Silbermann 0485115441 pearl 0 3.00 2000 Grovelling and Other Vices: The Sociology of Sycophancy
author: Alphons Silbermann
name: pearl
average rating: 3.00
book published: 2000
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/23
shelves: to-read, psychology, everything-is-shitty, sociology
review:

]]> Fisher's Hornpipe 428226 272 Todd McEwen 0553340972 pearl 0 4.27 1983 Fisher's Hornpipe
author: Todd McEwen
name: pearl
average rating: 4.27
book published: 1983
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/23
shelves: to-read, absurdist, literary-fiction, humor, adventure
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Roadside Picnic (S.F. Masterworks)]]> 198220961
First published in 1972, Roadside Picnic is still widely regarded as one of the greatest science fiction novels, despite the fact that it has been out of print in the United States for almost thirty years.]]> 209 Arkady Strugatsky 1399617206 pearl 5 3.98 1972 Roadside Picnic (S.F. Masterworks)
author: Arkady Strugatsky
name: pearl
average rating: 3.98
book published: 1972
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/22
date added: 2025/02/22
shelves: russia, science-fiction, dreamlike, everything-is-shitty, favorites, not-what-i-expected
review:
Really, really cool all the way to the very end.
]]> Harvest Home 816085
For Ned and his family, Cornwall Coombe was to become a place of ultimate horror.]]> 401 Thomas Tryon 0394485289 pearl 0 to-read, scary 3.82 1973 Harvest Home
author: Thomas Tryon
name: pearl
average rating: 3.82
book published: 1973
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/19
shelves: to-read, scary
review:

]]> The Return of Martin Guerre 333301
Now a noted historian, who served as consultant for a new French film on Martin Guerre, has searched archives and lawbooks to add new dimensions to a tale already abundant in mysteries: we are led to ponder how a common man could become an impostor in the sixteenth century, why Bertrande de Rols, an honorable peasant woman, would accept such a man as her husband, and why lawyers, poets, and men of letters like Montaigne became so fascinated with the episode.]]> 162 Natalie Zemon Davis 0674766911 pearl 0 to-read 3.75 1983 The Return of Martin Guerre
author: Natalie Zemon Davis
name: pearl
average rating: 3.75
book published: 1983
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval England: A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century]]> 4936457 319 Ian Mortimer 0224079948 pearl 0 to-read 3.99 2008 The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval England: A Handbook for Visitors to the Fourteenth Century
author: Ian Mortimer
name: pearl
average rating: 3.99
book published: 2008
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/19
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The ABC's of Triangle, Square, Circle: The Bauhaus and Design Theory]]> 41214245
"A fascinating work of design theory and graphic design." � Architectural Record

"…an extremely important primer for anyone who knows the legend but not the story of the Bauhaus and its methods." —Steven Heller, The Daily Heller

A new edition of a design classic on the Bauhaus, with a preface by leading designers Ellen Lupton and J. Abbot Miller.

Originally published in 1991, The ABC’s of Triangle, Square, Circle traces the origin and impact of the Bauhaus (the legendary art school in Dessau, Germany, operational from 1919 to 1933, that transformed architecture and design around the world) in relation to design, psychoanalysis, geometry, early childhood education, and popular culture.

The text is a provocative exploration of the school’s aims and achievements, while the book itself is a manifesto of Bauhaus ideals, synthesizing editorial concept, typography, and craftsmanship.

Designed in a manner that honors the aspirations of the Bauhaus, this extraordinary manual is a source of inspiration for design professionals and students and a revelation for all those interested in twentieth-century culture.]]> 72 J. Abbott Miller 1616897988 pearl 0 to-read 3.95 The ABC's of Triangle, Square, Circle: The Bauhaus and Design Theory
author: J. Abbott Miller
name: pearl
average rating: 3.95
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Critical Path 190038
Critical Path is Fuller's master work--the summing up of a lifetime's thought and concern--as urgent and relevant as it was upon its first publication in 1981. Critical Path details how humanity found itself in its current situation--at the limits of the planet's natural resources and facing political, economic, environmental, and ethical crises.

The crowning achievement of an extraordinary career, Critical Path offers the reader the excitement of understanding the essential dilemmas of our time and how responsible citizens can rise to meet this ultimate challenge to our future.]]> 471 R. Buckminster Fuller 0312174918 pearl 0 to-read, philosophy 4.23 1981 Critical Path
author: R. Buckminster Fuller
name: pearl
average rating: 4.23
book published: 1981
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: to-read, philosophy
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Technique for Producing Ideas]]> 534755 A step-by-step technique for sparking breakthrough creativity in advertising--or any field

Since its publication in 1965, A Technique for Producing Ideas has helped thousands of advertising copywriters smash through internal barriers to unleash their creativity. Professionals from poets and painters to scientists and engineers have also used the techniques in this concise, powerful book to generate exciting ideas on demand, at any time, on any subject. Now let James Webb Young's unique insights help you look inside yourself to find that big, elusive idea--and once and for all lift the veil of mystery from the creative process.

"James Webb Young is in the tradition of some of our greatest thinkers when he describes the workings of the creative process. The results of many years in advertising have proved to him that the key element in communications success is the production of relevant and dramatic ideas. He not only makes this point vividly for us but shows us the road to that goal."
--William Bernbach, Former Chairman and CEO, Doyle Dane Bernbach Inc.]]> 64 James Webb Young 0071410945 pearl 0 to-read 4.05 1940 A Technique for Producing Ideas
author: James Webb Young
name: pearl
average rating: 4.05
book published: 1940
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[I'm Afraid Debbie From Marketing Has Left for the Day: How to Use Behavioural Design to Create Change in the Real World]]> 46157312
Barack Obama used a secret competitive advantage to win two elections. Companies such as Google, Amazon and Novo Nordisk use the same insight to stir up innovation, increase compliance, improve the work environment and sell more products. And successful management groups in the C20 index have started using it as their preferred strategy. But what kind of insight are we talking about here?



The answer is � behavioural design. Because people in the real world don’t actually behave like the people we build all our usual strategies for. We are opposing human biology and psychology when we insist that good arguments, burning platforms, classic change management, pamphlets, campaigns, and joint meetings are the way to go.





Obama, Google and all the rest have instead opted to use an evidence-based approach to change behaviour, and when you’ve read I’m Afraid Debbie From Marketing Has Left for the Day, you can adopt this approach as well. In his book, Morten Münster has converted 40 years of research in human behaviour into an easily accessible method composed of four steps � a helping hand to all managers and employees who are thirsting for alternatives to conventional means.]]> Morten Münster 8702275848 pearl 0 to-read 4.09 I'm Afraid Debbie From Marketing Has Left for the Day: How to Use Behavioural Design to Create Change in the Real World
author: Morten Münster
name: pearl
average rating: 4.09
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> Soft Electronics 61185349 256 Jaro Gielens 3967040402 pearl 0 to-read 3.93 Soft Electronics
author: Jaro Gielens
name: pearl
average rating: 3.93
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> The New Typography 119149 288 Jan Tschichold 0520250125 pearl 0 to-read 4.13 1928 The New Typography
author: Jan Tschichold
name: pearl
average rating: 4.13
book published: 1928
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[How to Think Like a Great Graphic Designer]]> 426289
Allworth Press, an imprint of Skyhorse Publishing, publishes a broad range of books on the visual and performing arts, with emphasis on the business of art. Our titles cover subjects such as graphic design, theater, branding, fine art, photography, interior design, writing, acting, film, how to start careers, business and legal forms, business practices, and more. While we don't aspire to publish a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are deeply committed to quality books that help creative professionals succeed and thrive. We often publish in areas overlooked by other publishers and welcome the author whose expertise can help our audience of readers.]]> 248 Debbie Millman 1581154968 pearl 0 to-read, design, level-up 4.01 2007 How to Think Like a Great Graphic Designer
author: Debbie Millman
name: pearl
average rating: 4.01
book published: 2007
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: to-read, design, level-up
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Module, Proportion, Symmetry, Rhythm (Vision + Value Series)]]> 1345947 0 Gyorgy Kepes 0807603635 pearl 0 to-read 4.24 1966 Module, Proportion, Symmetry, Rhythm (Vision + Value Series)
author: Gyorgy Kepes
name: pearl
average rating: 4.24
book published: 1966
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[A Smile in the Mind: Witty Thinking in Graphic Design: Revised and Updated Edition]]> 25208270 Forty years of "witty thinking" from over 500 designers, including hundreds of visual examples and interviews with the world's top practitioners

First published in 1996, A Smile in the Mind rapidly became one of the most influential books in graphic design � a rich sourcebook of design ideas and an entertaining guide to the techniques behind witty thinking.

Now extensively revised and updated, this book explores the powerful role of wit in graphic design, making the case for wit, as the magical element that builds the world’s biggest brands and engages people with messages that matter. Packed with illustrations showcasing the use of wit by today’s practitioners alongside classic examples, A Smile in the Mind brings together the best projects from around the world and across the decades. The different routes designers can take are examined and illustrated with inspirational examples, exploring wit by technique (such as ambiguity, substitution and double takes), application (including posters, packaging and data visualization) and business area, spanning digital, retail, arts and culture, politics and even matters of life and death.

The book also features interviews with legendary designers past and present, answering the biggest question of all: how did they get the idea? Designers offer a glimpse into their private working methods and thought processes, and reveal the inspiration behind classic pieces of work.

Showcasing forty years of witty thinking and including over 1,000 projects and 500 designers and creative thinkers, A Smile in the Mind is an essential compendium of contemporary designs and a celebration of classic pieces, resulting in the definitive guide to wit in graphic design. Written with humour and insight, it offers designers a friendly read, a helpful sourcebook and a trigger for ideas.]]> 272 Beryl McAlhone 071486935X pearl 0 4.53 1996 A Smile in the Mind: Witty Thinking in Graphic Design: Revised and Updated Edition
author: Beryl McAlhone
name: pearl
average rating: 4.53
book published: 1996
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: to-read, design, level-up, psychology
review:

]]> <![CDATA[The Knight in the Panther's Skin]]> 28472396
Readers interested in medieval adventures and fantasy will find the poem irresistible as it depicts the world of brave knights and strong princesses, adventures on sea and land, magical creatures defeated to save the loved ones. Written in beautiful verse more than 800 years ago, the poem is wise, graceful, sometimes ironic, sometimes didactic. Its message of love and friendship, of battle of Good and Evil is universal and remains remarkably modern.

There were attempts at English translation. The book was first translated into English by Marjory Wardrope in prose (first published in 1912). An attempt of the poetic translation in was made by Venera Urushadze in 1968, followed by prose translations of Katherine Viviane and Robert Stevenson in 1977.

Finally, in 2015, ‘The Knight in the Panther Skin� was translated by Lyn Coffin with the help of some prominent Georgian scholars. This superb translation, combining the beauty of poetic imagery with quick wit and academic precision, is the first-ever translation that was made using the same 16-quadrant shairi form, as was used by the author himself.

The new translation brings the poem closer to the modern English-language readers than it’s ever been and has already met with critical acclaim by prominent scholars (Donald Rayfield, Stephen Jones).]]> 360 Shota Rustaveli 9941079269 pearl 0 4.64 1205 The Knight in the Panther's Skin
author: Shota Rustaveli
name: pearl
average rating: 4.64
book published: 1205
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/13
shelves: to-read, epic, friendship, poetry
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Dissipatio H.G.: The Vanishing]]> 52351634
Guido Morselli’s arresting postapocalyptic novel, written just before he died by suicide in 1973, depicts a man much like the author himself—lonely, brilliant, difficult—and a world much like our own, mesmerized by money, speed, and machines. Dissipatio H.G. is a precocious portrait of our Anthropocene world, and a philosophical last will and testament from a great Italian outsider.]]> 168 Guido Morselli 1681374765 pearl 0 3.61 1977 Dissipatio H.G.: The Vanishing
author: Guido Morselli
name: pearl
average rating: 3.61
book published: 1977
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/12
shelves: to-read, science-fiction, philosophy, dreamlike
review:

]]> Moscow to the End of the Line 117896 ]]> 164 Venedikt Erofeev 0810112000 pearl 0 to-read, russia 4.08 1969 Moscow to the End of the Line
author: Venedikt Erofeev
name: pearl
average rating: 4.08
book published: 1969
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/12
shelves: to-read, russia
review:

]]> The Suitcase 153300 128 Sergei Dovlatov 0802112463 pearl 0 4.36 1986 The Suitcase
author: Sergei Dovlatov
name: pearl
average rating: 4.36
book published: 1986
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/12
shelves: to-read, russia, short-stories
review:

]]> Omon Ra 18920977
Victor Pelevin's novel Omon Ra has been widely praised for its poetry and its wickedness, a novel in line with the great works of Gogol and "full of the ridiculous and the sublime," says The Observer [London]. Omon is chosen to be trained in the Soviet space program the fulfillment of his lifelong dream. However, he enrolls only to encounter the terrifying absurdity of Soviet protocol and its backward a bicycle-powered moonwalker; the outrageous Colonel Urgachin ("a kind of Sovier Dr. Strangelove"—The New York Times); and a one-way assignment to the moon. The New Yorker "Omon's adventure is like a rocket firing off its various stages—each incident is more jolting and propulsively absurd than the one before."]]> 118 Victor Pelevin 0811221245 pearl 0 3.80 1992 Omon Ra
author: Victor Pelevin
name: pearl
average rating: 3.80
book published: 1992
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/12
shelves: to-read, russia, science-fiction, everything-is-shitty, humor
review:

]]> The Doomed City 35133627 Roadside Picnic, has enjoyed great popularity worldwide. Yet the novel that was their own favorite, and that readers worldwide have acclaimed as their magnum opus, has never before been published in English. The Doomed City was so politically risky that the Strugatsky brothers kept its existence a complete secret even from their best friends for sixteen years after its completion in 1972. It was only published in Russia in the late 1980s, the last of their works to see publication. It was translated into a host of major European languages, and now appears in English in a major new translation by acclaimed translator Andrew Bromfield.

The Doomed City is set in an experimental city bordered by an abyss on one side and an impossibly high wall on the other. Its sole inhabitants are people who were plucked from Earth's history and left to govern themselves under conditions established by Mentors whose purpose seems inscrutable. Andrei Voronin, a young astronomer plucked from Leningrad in the 1950s, is a die-hard believer in the Experiment, even though he's now a garbage collector. And as increasingly nightmarish scenarios begin to affect the city, he rises through the political hierarchy, with devastating effect.]]> 480 Arkady Strugatsky 1473222281 pearl 0 3.92 1989 The Doomed City
author: Arkady Strugatsky
name: pearl
average rating: 3.92
book published: 1989
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/12
shelves: to-read, russia, science-fiction
review:

]]> The Forms Of Color 1014408 Karl Gerstner 0262071002 pearl 0 to-read, art, design 4.50 1990 The Forms Of Color
author: Karl Gerstner
name: pearl
average rating: 4.50
book published: 1990
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/08
shelves: to-read, art, design
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Forget All the Rules About Graphic Design: Including the Ones in This Book]]> 2057985 168 Bob Gill 0823018644 pearl 0 to-read, design, level-up 4.20 1981 Forget All the Rules About Graphic Design: Including the Ones in This Book
author: Bob Gill
name: pearl
average rating: 4.20
book published: 1981
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/08
shelves: to-read, design, level-up
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Graphic Design as a Second Language: Bob Gill]]> 342333 128 Bob Gill 1920744398 pearl 0 to-read, design, level-up 4.19 2006 Graphic Design as a Second Language: Bob Gill
author: Bob Gill
name: pearl
average rating: 4.19
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/08
shelves: to-read, design, level-up
review:

]]> Graphic Design Made Difficult 1787759 Bob Gill 0442010982 pearl 0 to-read, design, level-up 4.27 1992 Graphic Design Made Difficult
author: Bob Gill
name: pearl
average rating: 4.27
book published: 1992
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/08
shelves: to-read, design, level-up
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Moderne Werbe- und Gebrauchs-Grafik]]> 23441426 130 Hans Neuburg pearl 0 to-read, rare-as-hell, design 5.00 1960 Moderne Werbe- und Gebrauchs-Grafik
author: Hans Neuburg
name: pearl
average rating: 5.00
book published: 1960
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/08
shelves: to-read, rare-as-hell, design
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Conceptions of International Exhibitions]]> 14743498 211 Hans Neuburg pearl 0 to-read, rare-as-hell, design 5.00 1969 Conceptions of International Exhibitions
author: Hans Neuburg
name: pearl
average rating: 5.00
book published: 1969
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/08
shelves: to-read, rare-as-hell, design
review:

]]> <![CDATA[How to Lead When Your Boss Can't (or Won't)]]> 52286457 Every day millions of people with high potential are frustrated and held back by incompetent leaders. New York Times bestselling leadership author John C. Maxwell knows this because the number one question he gets asked is about how to lead when the boss isn’t a good leader.

You don’t have to be trapped in your work situation. In this book, adapted from the million-selling The 360-Degree Leader, Maxwell unveils the keys to successfully navigating the challenges of working for a bad boss. Maxwell teaches how to position yourself for current and future success, take the high road with a poor leader, avoid common pitfalls, work well with teammates, and develop influence wherever you find yourself.

Practicing the principles taught in this book will result in endless opportunities—for your organization, your career, and your life. You can learn how to lead when your boss can’t (or won’t).

]]> 158 John C. Maxwell 0785231161 pearl 0 to-read 4.11 How to Lead When Your Boss Can't (or Won't)
author: John C. Maxwell
name: pearl
average rating: 4.11
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[How to Win Friends and Influence People: Updated For the Next Generation of Leaders (Dale Carnegie Books)]]> 60002503 Updated for the first time in more than forty years, Dale Carnegie’s timeless bestseller How to Win Friends and Influence People—a classic that has improved and transformed the personal and professional lives of millions.

This new edition of the most influential self-help book of the last century has been updated under the care of Dale’s daughter, Donna, introducing changes that keep the book fresh for today’s readers, with priceless material restored from the original 1936 text.

One of the best-known motivational guides in history, Dale Carnegie’s groundbreaking publication has sold tens of millions of copies, been translated into almost every known written language, and has helped countless people succeed.

Carnegie’s rock-solid, experience-tested advice has remained relevant for generations because he addresses timeless questions about the art of getting along with people. How to Win Friends and Influence People teaches
-How to communicate effectively
-How to make people like you
-How to increase your ability to get things done
-How to get others to see your side
-How to become a more effective leader
-How to successfully navigate almost any social situation
-And so much more!

How to Win Friends and Influence People is a historic bestseller for one simple Its crucial life lessons, conveyed through engaging storytelling, have shown readers how to become who they wish to be. With the newly updated version of this classic, that’s as true now as ever.]]> 317 Dale Carnegie 1982171472 pearl 0 to-read 4.51 How to Win Friends and Influence People: Updated For the Next Generation of Leaders (Dale Carnegie Books)
author: Dale Carnegie
name: pearl
average rating: 4.51
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/07
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> <![CDATA[Developing the Leader Within You 2.0]]> 38915856 In this thoroughly revised and updated 25th-anniversary edition of his now-classic work, John C. Maxwell reveals how to develop the vision, value, influence, and motivation required of successful leaders—now in paperback.

Twenty-five years ago, John Maxwell published the book that forever transformed how we think about leadership.Developing the Leader Within Yourevolutionized the way leaders are made and in the process sold more than one million copies. Now John Maxwell returns to his classic text to include the leadership insights and practices he’s learned in the decades since the book first appeared. Thoroughly revised and with two completely new chapters, this new edition updates the foundational principles for transformative leadership that Maxwell has used as a leader for more than 40 years. No matter what arena you are called to?family, church, business, nonprofit?the principles Maxwell shares will positively impact your own life and the lives of those around you. New readers as well as longtime fans of Maxwell and the original book won’t want to miss out on this one.]]> 224 John C. Maxwell 0718074084 pearl 0 to-read 4.36 2018 Developing the Leader Within You 2.0
author: John C. Maxwell
name: pearl
average rating: 4.36
book published: 2018
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/07
shelves: to-read
review:

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