2017: 52 weeks / 52 books
Done. My resolution for 2017 was to read 52 books and I read 52 books. And finally, I found some time to brag about it.
Recently I proudly told my 93-years-old grandmother about this and she asked back “What, only 52?!? Lazy you!” (I will never forget how grannie read a full 120-page crime novel on a half hour cab ride from the airport…)
Anyway, I am happy with this achievement and most importantly it got me back into the habit of reading more fiction and I encountered new authors, stories and viewpoints. As Twyla Tharpe said: “What you are today and what you will be in five years depends on two things: the people you meet and the books you read.”
I relied mostly on recommendations from friends and family and tried a good mix of classics, fiction and non-fiction. My only rule was that there cannot be two books by the same author.
Here are the 52 books. Not a single one of them was bad at all:
#1 The Physicists by Friedrich Dürrenmatt
What is it about:
Three crazy men in a closed asylum who think they are famous physicists.
Notable sentence:
“There are risks which are not acceptable: the destruction of humanity is one of them.”
#2 What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami
What is it about:
Personal thoughts about running and writing by Japanese author Haruki Murakami
Notable sentence:
“An unhealthy soul requires a healthy body.”
#3 The Vegetarian by Han Kang
What is it about:
The downfall of a family after the youngest daughter decides to become a plant.
Favourite sentence:
“Even as a child, In-Hye had possessed the innate strength of character necessary to make one´s own way in life. As a daughter, as an older sister, as a wife and as a mother, as the owner of a shop, even as an underground passenger on the briefest of journeys, she had always done her best.”
#4 The Pearl by John Steinbeck
What is it about:
A fisherman´s family´s downfall after he finds an invaluable pearl.
Favourite sentence:
“A town is a thing like a colonial animal. A town has a nervous system and a head and shoulders and feet. A town is a thing separate from all other towns, so that there are no two towns alike. And a town has a whole emotion.”
#5 The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan
What is it about:
A man-hunt in the Scottish Highlands on the dawn of WWI.
Favourite sentence:
“If you are playing a part, you will never keep it up unless you convince yourself that you are it.”
#6 Fup by Jim Dodge
What is it about:
A grandson who lives a reclusive and eccentric farm life with his grandfather.
Favourite sentence:
“You white men desire to tame everything, but if you just stand still and feel for a moment you would know how everything yearns to be wild.”
#7 Media Control by Noam Chomsky
What is it about:
The US government´s PR and propaganda since WWI.
Favourite sentence:
“It is … necessary to whip up the population in support of foreign adventures. Usually the population is pacifist, just like they were during the First World War. The public sees no reason to get involved in foreign adventures, killing, and torture. So, you have to whip them up. And to whip them up you have to frighten them. “
#8 Comet in Moominland by Tove Jansson
What is it about:
Moomins and their friends who prepare for a comet that is about to hit their valley.
Favourite sentence:
“It´s strange”, said Moomintroll, “but it seems to me that we aren´t as afraid as any of those people, although we are going to the most dangerous place of all, and they´re leaving it.”
#9 We have always lived in the castle by Shirley Jackson
What is it about:
Two sisters who live reclusively in a castle after a murder mystery killed the rest of their family.
Favourite sentence:
“I have often thought that with any luck at all I could have been born a werewolf, because the two middle fingers on both my hands are the same length, but I have had to be content with what I had. “
#10 Muhammad Ali: A memoir by Michael Parkinson
What is it about:
It is about the life story of Muhammad Ali framed by four interviews he gave to Michael Parkinson from 1971–1980.
Favourite sentence:
“The real reason he fought for so long was that which made him a great champion: his indomitable courage, unyielding resolve, unquenchable willpower. To expect him to take a careful approach to his life, to work solidly and cautiously towards a pension, is to misunderstand the soul of a prize-fighter.”
#11 But you did not come back by Marceline Loridan-Ivens
What is it about:
It is about the life of a French Jew who survived the holocaust in Auschwitz.
Notable sentence:
“From my cell block, I could see the children walking to the gas chambers. I remember one little girl clinging to her doll. She looked lost, staring in space. Behind her were probably months of terror and being hunted. They´d just separated her from her parents, soon they´d tear off her clothes. She already looked like her limp, lifeless doll.“
#12 Grief is the thing with feathers by Max Porter
What is it about:
It is about a father of two who is trying to cope with the unexpected death of his wife.
Notable sentence:
“Moving on, as a concept, is for stupid people, because any sensible person knows grief is a long-term project. I refuse to rush. The pain that is thrust upon us let no man slow or speed or fix.”
#13 Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
What is it about:
It is about a man who travels down a river to bring back a rogue ivory trader who is worshiped like a god by natives in the 19th century Congolese jungle.
Notable sentence:
“Droll thing life is — that mysterious arrangement of merciless logic for a futile purpose. The most you can hope from it is some knowledge of yourself — that comes too late — a crop of inextinguishable regrets.”
#14 The innovator’s dilemma by Clayton M. Christensen
What is it about:
It is about when and how and why new technologies make great companies fail.
Notable sentence:
First, disruptive products are simpler and cheaper; they generally promise lower margins, not greater profits. Second, disruptive technologies typically are first commercialized in emerging or insignificant markets. And third, leading firms’ most profitable customers generally don’t want, and indeed initially can’t use, products based on disruptive technologies.
#15 Trout Fishing in America by Richard Brautigan
What is it about:
Rural America and the hunt for a bit of trout fishing.
Notable sentence:
Pard was wearing a beard and he looked as if he had a huge soul, with barely enough room in his body to contain it.
#16 The Guest Cat by Takashi Hiraide
What is it about:
A couple in Tokyo who make a memorable encounter with a cat.
Notable sentence:
“It seems she was hit by a car last Sunday night. But there were no external wounds. She just lay there in the street with such a calm expression on her pretty face. That’s what was so strange.”
#17 Castle Gripsholm. A Summer Story by Kurt Tucholsky
What is it about:
Two lovers who, during a summertime idyll in the Swedish countryside, encounter a crying young girl and other adventures.
Notable sentence:
“Friendship, this is like home.”
#18 The Movie Speaker by Hernán Rivera Letelier
What is it about:
A girl in a little Chilean village who narrates movies so vividly that her narrations become better than the actual movies.
Notable sentence:
“To narrate a life is the same as to narrate a movie.”
#19 Cool Hand Luke by Donn Pearce
What is it about:
A prisoner who cannot be broken.
Notable sentence:
“Wherever you go and whatever you do. Always play a real cool hand.”
#20 The postman always rings twice by James M. Cain
What is it about:
An amoral young drifter who kills his mistress’ husband.
Notable sentence:
“We were up on a mountain. We were up so high, Frank. We had it all, out there, that night. I didn’t know I could feel anything like that. And we kissed and sealed it, so it would be there forever, no matter what happened. We had more than any two people in the world. And then we fell down.”
#21 The Death of Ivan Ilyich by Leo Tolstoy
What is it about:
It is about a man who realises only on his deathbed that he lived a meaningless life.
Notable sentence:
“There also the further back he looked the more life there had been. There had been more of what was good in life and more of life itself. The two merged together. “Just as the pain went on getting worse and worse, so my life grew worse and worse,” he thought.
#22 GRIT by Angela Duckworth
What is it about:
It explains why passion and resilience are the secrets to success.
Notable sentence:
Thinking of yourself as someone who is able to overcome tremendous adversity often leads to behaviour that confirms that self-conception.
#23 Tonio Kröger by Thomas Mann
What is it about:
the story of a writer’s struggle for meaning and fulfilment in life and art.
Notable sentence:
“He who loves the more is the inferior and must suffer.”
#24 The Queen of Spades by Alexander Pushkin
What is it about:
A card player, whose obsession with winning becomes a curse.
Notable sentence:
Two fixed ideas can no more exist together in the moral world than two bodies can occupy one and the same place in the physical world.
#25 Creativity Inc. by Ed Catmull
What is it about:
The history of animation house Pixar and how they structure their creative process.
Notable sentence:
Don’t wait for things to be perfect before you share them with others. Show early and show often. It’ll be pretty when we get there, but it won’t be pretty along the way.
#26 Our souls at night by Kent Haruf
What is it about:
Two elderly widowers fall in love and have to overcome outside prejudices.
Notable sentence:
“I do love this physical world. I love this physical life with you. And the air and the country. The backyard, the gravel in the back alley. The grass. The cool nights. Lying in bed talking with you in the dark.”
#27 Dream Story by Arthur Schnitzler
What is it about:
The psychological transformations of Doctor Fridolin over a two-day period after his wife confesses having had sexual fantasies involving another man
Notable sentence:
It seemed to him a thousand times worse to stand there as the only one unmasked amid a host of masks, than suddenly to stand naked among those fully dressed.
#28 The Quiet American by Graham Greene
What is it about:
A young idealistic American has to deal with realities during French colonialism in Vietnam
Notable sentence:
“Sooner or later…one has to take sides. If one is to remain human.”
#29 The Storyteller’s secret by Carmine Gallo
What is it about:
The book explores tools and techniques that enhance storytelling.
Notable sentence:
The greatest waste is an unfulfilled idea that fails to connect with audiences, not because it’s a bad idea, but because it’s not packaged in a way that moves people.
#30 A streetcar named desire by Tennessee Williams
What is it about:
Fading southern belle Blanche who is faced with cruel realities when visiting her younger sister.
Notable sentence:
Some things are not forgiveable. Deliberate cruelty is not forgiveable. It is the most unforgiveable thing in my opinion, and the one thing in which I have never, ever been guilty of.
#31 Seize the day by Saul Bellow
What is it about:
About the slow demise of fading charmer Tommy over the course of a day
Notable sentence:
“I want to tell you, don’t marry suffering. Some people do. They get married to it, and sleep and eat together, just as husband and wife. If they go with joy they think it’s adultery.”
#32 The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
What is it about:
A woman driven to the brink of insanity by the rest cure prescribed to her.
Notable sentence:
“It is dull enough to confuse the eye in following, pronounced enough to constantly irritate and provoke study, and when you follow the lame uncertain curves for a little distance they suddenly commit suicide — plunge off at outrageous angles, destroy themselves in unheard of contradictions.”
#33 Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
What is it about:
It is about a traveling salesman and his inability to accept change within himself and society
Notable sentence:
“Why am I trying to become what I don’t want to be … when all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I say I know who I am.”
#34 Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin
What is it about:
A young American’s exploration of life and his own sexuality in 1950s Paris
Notable sentence:
“Most of the time I just made love with the body. That can make one very lonely.”
#35 Creatures of a day by Irvin D. Yalom
What is it about:
Real life stories about sessions with a psychotherapist.
Notable sentence:
As Nietzsche said, “If we have our own ‘why’ of life, we shall get along with any ‘how.
#36 Six Degrees of Separation by John Guare
What is it about:
A tragic-comical look at race, class and manners in the modern American society
Notable sentence:
Mom said sleeping with you was like sleeping with a salad made of bad dressing.
#37 Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl
What is it about:
A chronic Frankl’s experience as a holocaust survivor in Auschwitz
Notable sentence:
Freedom is in danger of degenerating into mere arbitrariness unless it is lived in terms of responsibleness. That is why I recommend that the Statue of Liberty on the East Coast be supplemented by a Statue of Responsibility on the West Coast.
#38 Withnail and I by Bruce Robinson
What is it about:
Two stoned London flatmates in the late 1960s and their weekend trip to the Lake District
Notable sentence:
“We want the finest wines available to humanity, we want them here and we want them now!”
#39 The obstacle is the way by Ryan Holiday
What is it about:
A practical guide on how to handle adversity and failure
Notable sentence:
Wherever we are, whatever we’re doing and wherever we are going, we owe it to ourselves, to our art, to the world to do it well.
#40 The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell
What is it about:
The book explains how and why epidemics spread
Notable sentence:
That is the paradox of the epidemic: that in order to create one contagious movement, you often have to create many small movements first.
#41 The Creative Habit by Twyla Tharp
What is it about:
A guide on how to foster and maintain a creative habit.
Notable sentence:
“I read for growth, firmly believing that what you are today and what you will be in five years depends on two things: the people you meet and the books you read.”
#42 Terror by Ferdinand von Schirach
What is it about:
A courtroom drama about moral complexity in times of terrorism
Notable sentence:
Life cannot be measured in numbers. Humanity is not a market.
#43 Lottie and Lisa by Erich Kästner
What is it about:
Twin girls who were separated at birth meet at summer camp by chance.
Notable sentence:
Time passes. It doesn’t know any better.
#44 Just kids by Patti Smith
What is it about:
Pattis Smith’s relationship with with Robert Mapplethorpe in the epochal days of New York City
Notable sentence:
Where does it all lead? What will become of us? These were our young questions, and young answers were revealed. It leads to each other. We become ourselves.
#45 Letting Go by David R. Hawkins
What is it about:
A self-help book that explains how to release negative emotions
Notable sentence:
The person who suffers from inner poverty is relentlessly driven to accumulate on the material level.
#46 Hannah and her Sisters by Woody Allen
What is it about:
The intertwined stories of three sisters and their circle of friends over the course of two years
Notable sentence:
“For all my education, accomplishments and so-called wisdom, I can’t fathom my own heart.”
#47 Little Black Book of Innovation by Scott D. Anthony
What is it about:
A step-to-step guide on how to create and embed innovation in corporations
Notable sentence:
The inherently risky nature of innovation means that companies can’t reward innovation efforts the way they reward core activities: an innovation team can do the exact right things and still fail or succeed in spite of doing the exact wrong things. Worse, remember that when it comes to innovation, perceived failure is often an important step toward ultimate success.
#48 Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut
What is it about:
A science-fiction infused anti-war story set in 1940s Germany.
Notable sentence:
“And Lot’s wife, of course, was told not to look back where all those people and their homes had been. But she did look back, and I love her for that, because it was so human. So she was turned into a pillar of salt. So it goes.”
#49 Flashboys by Michael Lewis
What is it about:
High-Frequency trading and its effects on stock markets.
Notable sentence:
The world clings to its old mental picture of the stock market because it’s comforting; because it’s so hard to draw a picture of what has replaced it; and because the few people able to draw it for you have no interest in doing so.
#50 The invention of Morel by Adolfo Bioy Casares
What is it about:
A fugitive hides on a desert island from tourists until he falls in love with one of them
Notable sentence:
The habits of our lives make us presume that things will happen in a certain foreseeable way, that there will be a vague coherence in the world.
#51 The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz
What is it about:
The tough journey of building and maintaining a tech business.
Notable sentence:
Great CEOs face the pain. They deal with the sleepless nights, the cold sweats, and what my friend the great Alfred Chuang (legendary cofounder and CEO of BEA Systems) calls “the torture.” Whenever I meet a successful CEO, I ask them how they did it. Mediocre CEOs point to their brilliant strategic moves or their intuitive business sense or a variety of other self-congratulatory explanations. The great CEOs tend to be remarkably consistent in their answers. They all say, “I didn’t quit.”
#52 The Royal Tenenbaums by Wes Anderson and Owen Wilson
What is it about:
Three gifted siblings and their struggle in adulthood.
Notable sentence:
“I think we’re just gonna to have to be secretly in love with each other and leave it at that, Richie.”
