Books Read: December 2022

Another year of reading is mostly done for me. I didn’t read nearly as much in December as in previous months, but that can be attributed to a change in attitude about things, which I already discussed. That being said, I am reading, just more slowly and with a bit more of a deliberate pace. I’m also in the middle of the a 700 page novel, so it’s taking me a while.

I don’t typically pick out best books read, mostly because it takes a while for a book to take a hold of me and I like to see what I’m thinking about a year after I’ve read it. That being said, if I were to recommend one or two from this year it would be The Quiet Before by Beckerman (read in July) or Small Things Like These (read in January). Here’s to more great reading and thinking in 2023 friends!

Two Heads: A Graphic Exploration of How Our Brains Work with Other Brains

An incredibly clever graphic novel about your brain and how it works written by two well regarded scientists? Yes, please. This book was so much fun to read, so well written and drawn, and so interesting. The two scientists are a married couple who both have studied the brain but focusing on different specific niches. What was best of all was the really well done interlude about how science is done and how to know what to trust when reading studies. Highly recommend this one.

Gideon The Ninth

I’m not quite sure how many friends I have who’ve raved about this book and the entire series, but it’s quite a few. I picked up the free kindle version of it from Tor a while back and tried to read it several times but just couldn’t get going with it, it didn’t hook me in. Then Mandy mentioned that the audio books are quite good and it was available from the library right away! The woman who reads them is amazing. After listening to it I went on to read it and I have to say, I enjoyed it, the last quarter of the book is really quite good, but I don’t love it. The world building wasn’t quite as complete as I’d like, so I was often confused and the plot really moved slowly for at least the first half. I will most likely listen to the next two in the series because of the woman who reads, they’re perfect to have on while knitting.