Day: August 5, 2022

Roman Fever and Other Stories by Edith Wharton

Enjoyed this little book of short stories by Wharton. I liked a lot of them had satire and darkly humorous ones. It was also largely dominated by female characters.

Read June 20-July 3, 2022

The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green

I listened to this while I was bed ridden with COVID-19. It was really good. John Green is one of those authors whom I prefer their nonfiction work to their fiction.

Listened May 20-July 7, 2022.

The Dutch House by Ann Patchett

This was such a good book and listen. Patchett asked Tom Hanks to narrate the audiobook and says the audiobook is better than the written one as a result. She said it’s funnier. It’s true. It’s a darkly funny story at times because of Hanks’s narration. I listened to it while recovering and I loved it. It gripped me. I’ve always liked Patchett’s prose and I loved the setting and the characters.

Listened July 7-9, 2022.

Dial A for Aunties by Jesse Q Sutanto

This was chaotic. A lot of stuff happened. It’s a summer read centred around a murder, mystery, romance, and family. It’ was non stop drama and action. It would actually make for a fun dark sitcom. The narrator is an actor of Indonesian descent and could do the accents. I just found the story too frenzied for me to enjoy. The Aunties were amusing for the most part but then also annoying and stereotypical caricatures at other things. The love interest was boring too. He was like the one in a lot of romance stories where he has no flaws and you’re suppose to buy into the main romance. While I found some moments amusing and it was a real romp as I recovered, I do not think I will continue this series.

Listened July 9, 2022.

The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett

This was a plane read. It was short. Even though it’s product of its time because it has lots of misogyny, homophobia, and other issues, I enjoyed it. I found it better written than The Big Sleep. It was a more cohesive plot.

Read July 18, 2022.

Reboot Your Portfolio: 9 Steps to Successful Investing with ETFs by Dan Bortolotti

I am fan of the author’s blog. There is nothing really new that I didn’t know here but definitely good overall.

Read July 23, 2022

The Verifiers by Jane Pek

This is a debut novel which is a mainly a mystery with a dash of Chinese-American family storytelling. The writing is not bad exactly but the climax was a bit of a let down. It seemed to be building up to nothing much at all. Maybe it’s because I am familiar with IT and digital consumerism but I found the IT stuff boring. Maybe this kind of suspense would have worked if the world didn’t have bigger problems right now. It feels like this will be a series, but I did not find enough roundness or intrigue in the characters for me to continue.

Read July 24-25, 2022.

A Random Walk Down Wall Street: The Time-Tested Strategy for Successful Investing by Burton G. Malkiel

Most of the info from this book I already knew from taken undergrad econ classes years ago, econ podcasts, or other investment books. This is a well written and thorough history of American and world investment financing. In terms of helping with personal investing, most of the info is too American leaning. However, I still found this a good run down history finance.

Read July 24-27, 2022.