Another year has ended, and with it another bout of reading. I read fewer books this year than the last 2, for a total of 41, mostly due to the increased amount of gaming I did this year (A new Zelda game coming out will do that, as will getting a brand new laptop), and who knows what this next year will bring. I’ve got a lot of new hobbies to try out from my Christmas gifts, courtesy of my wife; maybe whittling will replace reading and I’ll just post a menagerie of wooden animals next time. Whatever happens, and without any further ado, here are the 4th Annual Book Awards.

Awards

Best Trilogy: The Red Rising Trilogy by Pierce Brown
I loved these books. I’d only heard a little about Red Rising before reading them, from a coworker back in college who loves them, but I was in the mood for some new fantasy/sci-fi and this seemed to fit the bill. It took me a little while to get into the first book, but once I did I was hooked, and devoured the rest easily. It was a little violent, but I think the author used it well to show realism as well as character growth, so it was fine with me. Certainly one of my favorite trilogy reading experiences. 9/10
(It’s worth noting that there are 3 more books in the series, with a finale on the way, but the next two books were sub-par, so I didn’t include them here. I did love the 6th book though.)

Runner-up: The Mistborn Trilogy by Brandon Sanderson
Unlike Red Rising, I couldn’t stop hearing about Brandon Sanderson and the amazing, magical things he does with his writing. After years of resistance (and reading one of his weaker books last year) I finally picked up Mistborn and had an enjoyable time reading through the trilogy. It was entertaining, and the world and magic system described were quite interesting, though maybe not as mind-blowing as everyone seems to say. It got a bit long, and I was ready to be done when I started the third book, but Sanderson did do a great job of weaving the threads from each book together, making some fun twists and turns. 8.5/10

Best Handyman’s Book: Building: A Carpenter’s Notes on Life and the Art of Good Work by Mark Ellison
There’s something about doing manual labor and getting my hands dirty that resonates with me. I like the idea of creating something tangible with my own skill, so reading about the experiences and lessons learned from a professional carpenter seemed like a promising venture. Mark has done carpentry for decades, working on some of the ritziest places out there, and it was interesting hearing what that’s like. It did get a bit overlong, and his meandering style sometimes left me wondering what the point of a certain story was, but he did have a nice epilogue that wrapped everything up neatly. He seemed to have a bit of a beef with the newfangled ways people are doing carpentry and architecture, disparaging the use of 3D modeling/rendering software and people that don’t get their hands dirty, but it wasn’t too bad. So overall it was a solid book with interesting ideas and anecdotes, but I doubt I’ll ever read it again. 7/10

Worst Handyman’s Book: Shop Class as Soul-Craft: An Inquiry into the Value of Work by Matthew Crawford
This one was a tough read. Like Building, the premise seemed solid: a guy who previously studied at college but didn’t find fulfillment until he started working on cars and motorcycles talking about his experiences and the lessons he’s learned. Unfortunately, Crawford lacked the tact and nuance to speak convincingly about the virtue of handywork/manual labor, especially since he seemed to so fully fail to grasp the variety and depth of what “knowledge work” entails. I don’t want to get into it here, but suffice it to say that, while he did have some interesting ideas about work, reality, and creativity, they were overshadowed by his arrogance and pride. Overall, not my favorite. 4.5/10

Best History That Felt Far Too Relevant Today: The Storm Before the Storm by Mike Duncan
Mike Duncan is the creator of The History of Rome podcast, which is one of my favorites and which I’ve listened to several times now, so when I learned that he wrote a book about Roman history I was quite excited. The book is about the events that led up to the events that caused the fall of the Roman republic (i.e. what circumstances allowed Caesar to rise to prominence and become who he became), and Duncan really delivered. As the award title suggests, the events described in the book had some shocking parallels to current political events in the U.S., and it hit really close to home to see what happened and how things ended up. The pacing was excellent, with the perfect blend of politics and action, so I never got bogged down but still felt like I was getting enough to understand what was happening. I could have perhaps used a little more analysis to accompany the listing of events, but that’s a small thing and I still really liked the book. 9.5/10

Best General History: A History of the Medieval World by Susan Wise Bauer
This is the second in what I’ve discovered is a trilogy of history books, and like the first that I read two years ago, this book was excellent. Bauer has her characteristic wit and charm, and although I got a bit bogged down in all the names (places, people, peoples, etc.), I still really enjoyed the read. Her map usage is off the charts helpful and interesting, and her narrative is really engaging. 9/10

Most Disappointing: Pump: A Natural History of the Heart by Bill Schutt
I really had high hopes for this one: the topic is fascinating, the cover looks great (I know, never judge a book by its cover), and it was my first book of the new year. Unfortunately, it just wasn’t a good book. For ostensibly being a history of the heart, the author talked about non-heart stuff for much too long, and when he did talk about heart stuff, he wasn’t half as clever or as interesting as he thought he was. I don’t want to be too brutal, so I’ll just say it was not for me. 4/10

Runner-up: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
One of the most common things I saw about this book was that if you liked the Discworld books, you would like Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. As should be obvious by now, I love Discworld, so I was looking forward to jumping into another classic comedy filled with British humor. And it was alright. The “plot”, if it could be called that, was just a series of random events happening one after another, with no unifying thread, and the characters were all flat and rather unlikeable to me. There were funny parts, and I can tell Adams is a clever writer with sharp wit, but I really didn’t need to read through the recipe for an alien drink made of alien ingredients. 6/10

Best Fantasy: Going Postal by Terry Pratchett
This book quickly became one of my favorite Discworld books ever. It follows Moist von Lipwig, a non-descript master conman who has been captured and “executed”, but is given a second chance at a good life by the dictator of the city. He becomes the postmaster general of the defunct Ankh-Morpork post office, hijinks ensue, and it was just a fabulous ride from beginning to end. Moist is a very fun character to follow, and the plot was great. 10/10

Good Book that Got Me at the Right Place at the Right Time: Four-Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals by Oliver Burkeman
This was an excellent book that really did get me at the right time. Some might think it’s full of platitudes or clichés, and it might be, but for me it was a refreshing take on the classic “Organize your life! Maximize your productivity!” type books; instead of promoting efficiency and streamlining, he advocates for slowing down and enjoying life as it is, and taking a more practical view of the time we have. There’s a lot of things I really liked about this book, and I can’t get into everything, but I highly recommend it and will almost certainly be reading it again soon. 9.5/10

Good Book that Got Me at the Wrong Place at the Wrong Time: Human Hacking: Win Friends, Influence People, and Leave Them Better Off for Having Met You by Christopher J. Hadnagy and Seth Schulman
The premise of this book is interesting, and the stories they told were interesting, but it didn’t resonate with me the way Four-Thousand Weeks did. I’m sure others have need or desire to influence people the way this book describes, but I never found myself really wanting/needing to apply what I read. It was still a good read, but not for me at the time. 8/10

Good Book that I Don’t Want to Read Again: Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson
This is one of those books that’s really important and impactful, but that I don’t enjoy reading. Stevenson is a great storyteller, and the stories he tells are important, heavy stories about the injustices that pervade the American justice system. He talks about the ways people are mistreated and discriminated against by those with power; how some people will do everything in their power to keep someone in prison just because they don’t like them, even when all evidence and circumstances indicate they are innocent; how a child is abused and traumatized every day because of the malice of a few authorities. It was horribly enlightening, and had good messages of hope and I’m glad I read it, but it also made me angry and hateful, so it was a double-edged sword. 9/10

Best Animal Book: An Immense World by Ed Yong
I loved this book. It took Neuroscience, which I love, and combined it with animals, which I love, and explored the huge variety of sensory abilities in the animal kingdom, from echolocation to heat perception to pheromone detection and beyond. It was absolutely awesome. The examples were fascinating and it was extremely well-written, and I could definitely see myself reading it again. Very reminiscent of Sentient that I read last year. 10/10

Runner-up: Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? by Frans de Waal
This wasn’t quite the thrill ride that An Immense World was, but it was still very interesting. de Waal was great at explaining and supporting his own or the dominant views while still acknowledging other possible explanations for the data he presented. It was more technical in its jargon, which made it a bit difficult to get through sometimes, but I loved learning about animal intelligence, especially the traits we humans erroneously claim exclusively for ourselves (e.g. memory, tool use, delayed gratification, etc.). I think animals really are more intelligent than we give them credit for, and this book reinforced that belief. An excellent read. 9/10

And that wraps it up for this year’s book awards! As always, I’d love to hear your thoughts on any of the books I’ve read, or any books you think I should read in the future.