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My 2011 Reading List

18 Jan

Here’s the list of books I read in 2011, including my ratings of them on a scale from 1 to 10.  I read 25 books in 2011, substantially down from the 40 before that in 2010, the 49 in 2009, and the 50 in 2008.  I blame this on a pretty rough year, a lot of moving and upheaval, and starting up a more technical-based school degree.  It was a year of more coding than reading. :)  Obviously anything rated 10 is a must-read!

From my Google shared Docs: (text, spreadsheet)

  1. (7) Reset: Iran, Turkey, and America’s Future – Stephen Kinzer
  2. (6) Amexica: War Along the Borderline – Ed Vulliamy
  3. (7) Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge – E.O. Wilson
  4. (8) How to Run the World:  Charting a Course to the Next Renaissance – Parag Khanna
  5. (7) Forever War, The – Joe Haldeman
  6. (8) We Seven: By the Astronauts Themselves – Shepard, Glenn, et al
  7. (10) Father of Money: Buying Peace in Baghdad – Jason Whiteley
  8. (10) Open: An Autobiography – Andre Agassi
  9. (7) Martin Luther King, Jr.: A Life – Marshall Frady
  10. (8) What Technology Wants – Kevin Kelly
  11. (9) Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny – Robert Wright
  12. (6) Dancing in the Glory of Monsters: The Collapse of the Congo and the Great War of Africa - Jason Stearns
  13. (8) In-N-Out Burger: A Behind-the-Counter Look at the Fast-Food Chain That Breaks All the Rules – Stacy Perman
  14. (10) Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly – Anthony Bourdain
  15. (5) Roseannearchy: Dispatches from the Nut Farm – Roseanne Barr
  16. (8) The Next Decade: Where We’ve Been… And Where We’re Going – George Friedman
  17. (7) The Economics of Happiness: Building Genuine Wealth – Mark Anielski
  18. (9) The Flight of the Creative Class: The New Global Competition for Talent – Richard Florida
  19. (8) Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs: A Low Culture Manifesto – Chuck Klosterman
  20. (10) Tiger Trap: America’s Secret Spy War with China – David Wise
  21. (7) Fight Club: A Novel – Chuck Palahniuk
  22. (10) The Secret Sentry: The Untold History of the National Security Agency – Matthew Aid
  23. (6) Rafa: My Story – John Carlin, Rafael Nadal
  24. (6) This Side of Paradise – F. Scott Fitzgerald
  25. (10) Steve Jobs – Walter Isaacson

 

Here’s past blog posts I made on annual book reading lists.  The “what to read in international affairs” post needs updating, bad.

Also, here’s a txt file of my Kindle highlights.  And a Wordle made up of the Kindle highlights:

 

 
2 Comments

Posted in Books

 
  • http://katematlock.com katematlock

    I have read #14 and #19. I think you’re being a little bit generous with the grade for #19, but it’s been a while since I’ve read it; and in comparison with your other reading, it might have been a nice change of pace. As for Tony Bourdain – I <3 him.

  • Ben Turner

    Well, to be fair, Klosterman is totally a men’s type of writer, right?  That may be why I rated him higher than you would?  Also he writes about the stuff I experienced as a kid, like The Real World and other pointless MTVish trivia.