Things I’ve read
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Recent reads: October 2024
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Recent reads: August 2024
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Recent reads: June 2024
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The Power Broker
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Recent reads: March 2024
Reading my way through some lighter books to supplement my long term read of Robert Caro.
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Recent reads: February 2024
Not every read was an amazing one, but reading is an adventure and starting each book you never know where you'll end up.
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Recent reads: December 2023
Another list of books, but this one includes some books that are, quite possibly, the best books I read in 2023.
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Saving Time
Odell has left me thinking a lot about time, how I see it in day to day life, how the way I think about time shifts, and how our society views time.
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Recent reads: November 2023
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Recent reads: End of summer
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Recent reads: July 2023
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Recent reads: May 2023
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Recent reads: March 2023
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Recent reads: February 2023
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Daniel Deronda
A slow read over the course of a month through Victorian English society while I absorbed the amazing writing of Eliot.
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Books Read: December 2022
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Books Read: November 2022
Still here so still reading.
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Books Read: October 2022
Reading as escape to get through what our current times are like.
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Books Read: September 2022
Reading as the temperatures cool down and the nights grow longer.
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Books Read: August 2022
Amidst continuing heat, some smoke, books were read and enjoyed.
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Books Read: July 2022
More books, read amidst heat waves, travel, and the garden.
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Books Read: June 2022
Reading good old fashioned paper books again and loving.
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Books Read: May 2022
Rain and cool weather and books as spring continued to be strange, but not necessarily in a bad way.
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Books Read: April 2022
As spring weather whiplashed between hot days and cold, rainy days, books were read.
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Books Read: March 2022
Books were read as spring appeared around me.
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Books Read: February 2022
Books were read as the pandemic eased and a mad man invaded a country for no reason.
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Books Read: January 2022
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Books Read: December 2021
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Books Read: November 2021
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Books Read: October 2021
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Books Read: September 2021
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Books Read: August 2021
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Braiding Sweetgrass
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Books Read: July 2021
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Books Read: June 2021
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Books Read: May 2021
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Books Read: April 2021
This month is an eclectic mix, but it's turned out that I'm reading the right books at the right time.
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Books Read: March 2021
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Books Read: February 2021
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Books Read: January 2021
New year, more books.
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Books Read: December 2020
A month of reading voraciously and finding books that I didn't know I needed until I was reading them.
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Books Read: November 2020
A month of reading slowly, savoring, thinking, and reading some more.
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Books Read: October 2020
The books that came my way in the past month.
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Books Read: September 2020
September books! Not many, but a great one.
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Books Read: August 2020
Recently read books and thoughts about them.
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Heartland
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Books Read: July 2020
Recently read books and thoughts about them.
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God Land
A book that felt like it was written just for me.
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Books read: June 2020
A month where focus returned and I devoured books.
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Books read: April and May 2020
I didn't read as many things as usual and I blame Hilary Mantel for that.
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Books read: March 2020
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Books read: February 2020
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The Secrets We Kept
Inspired by the way in which the CIA used Doctor Zhivago as a propaganda tool in the 1950s, Prescott weaves a tale told from both sides and it sucked me in.
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How to Disappear
The book left me wanting something more. Something more about the fact that our current technology asks us to sacrifice a great deal of privacy in order to use it.
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The Song of Achilles
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Moomin books one and two
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Life in Code: A Personal History of Technology
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Vera Stanhope
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A Legacy of Spies
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Working
Caro reflects deeply on his work, what makes it successful, and why truth matters and writing matters. He's best known for his in depth writing on Robert Moses and Lyndon Johnson, but what he's really writing about, as he readily says, is power.
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Resilient Management
My bottom line is even if you aren't interested in managing people, this book is well worth reading.
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City of Girls
In Vivian, Gilbert creates a fascinating character and I loved following her life because it didn't go at all where I expected.
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The Remains of the Day
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Milkman
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The Summer Book
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The Spectator Bird
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The Reporter's Kitchen
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Winter
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Anything is Possible
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How to Do Nothing
Odell isn't actually calling for us to do nothing, she's calling for us to be deliberate with our attention, to focus it on the things we care about and that matter.
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Gnomon
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Artemis
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Educated
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Fasting and Feasting
This book was inspirational in that way, showing a person who didn't just follow along with what was expected but rather did what she wanted.
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The Sixth Extinction
I wouldn't say that I enjoyed this book so much as that I'm very glad I read it and am still pondering much of what she wrote.
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Spring book roundup
I've been reading a lot of mysteries and one thriller lately so I thought I'd throw them all in one post. One was fantastic and the rest were entertaining.
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Conversations with Friends
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Circe
I know I've already said this once about a book I've finished this year, but this one is also in the running for my best read of 2019.
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Keep Going
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The Library Book
It's still quite early in 2019, but this book is in the running for my favorite book of the year right now, I loved it and had a hard time putting it down.
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Wrecked
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Echo
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Girls of Paper & Fire
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The Victorian Internet
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Confabulations
Although I rarely reread books, I'll most likely be reading this one again in the near future.
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A Death of No Importance
This was a great "TV book", a light read, a break from the world, and completely entertaining.
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Bloodchild and other stories
These stories were quick reads and got me thinking, which is what her work always does; I'm grateful for it.
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The Good Neighbor: The Life and Work of Fred Rogers
His legacy is a long one and I only hope that in some way kids today get to experience the magic of spending a half hour with him.
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The Hat Trilogy
This series does what so many great picture books do, Klassen uses the illustrations to great effect for the story.
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The Friend
This book ended up being different than I expected in all the best ways and if you like reading, writing, and dogs, I highly recommend it.
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Blue Mars
I really enjoyed the entire series, but I especially enjoyed the way in which KSR wrapped it up. The focus on characters I'd come to know well and who were changing as they were living these amazing long lives was fascinating.
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Our Souls at Night
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Green Mars
I'll also say this: these books are hard in many ways, Mars isn't easy, Earth is falling apart, but as is normal for KSR, I always end feeling hope.
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The Creative Habit
But Tharp does something more in this book, she showed me a whole world of other artists who've written about creativity in their journals and other writings.
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Red Mars
The amazing thing about KSR's writing is how he always leaves me feeling hopeful, even when things aren't going well.
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Autumn
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Writing for Designers
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Image Performance
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The Female Persuasion
Greer finds success and she mends fences, but something about it all was a bit too trite and easy for me in the end.
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Design as Art
I enjoyed this dip into the 1960s way of thinking about both art and design and I recommend it.
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Quick takes
Mysteries I've read lately
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The Power
The Power made me wonder so much about what is truly related to one's gender and human nature versus what we tell ourselves those things mean.
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Hilda
Delightful graphic novels about adventures of a hilarious girl.
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A God in Ruins
It's hard to see how we get to the after of most things right now.
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Flexible Typesetting
I'm so grateful to Tim and the team at ABA for making these books. This is a book I know I'll be returning to as I try and learn more about type.
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Thinking in Systems: A Primer
At this point in my life I'm content to let it open me up to thinking both about my work differently and about the world differently.
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Summerland
I really enjoyed this book because it was constantly revealing new things to me.
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New York 2140 and Occupied
In both these stories I can see how we as a planet may react to climate change.
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Mysteries round-up
I've spent my time this summer reading a lot of mysteries. For some reason the page turning of trying to figure out who did it, usually in a different part of the world or era than I live in, takes me away from the reality of this world we live in.
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Public Libraries and other stories
In between the short stories she includes vignettes of various people's thoughts on libraries. I'll admit it, I absolutely love these vignettes.
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Going Offline
Thanks Jeremy, for writing this, for giving me some confidence in writing a bit of JavaScript and for helping me make my site into a PWA!
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Gods and Beasts
This book was what I like to a call a TV book, easy reading that can be done when tired in the evenings after a long day instead of zoning out in front of the TV. And right now, with summer here, and me hustling to do some new things for work, it's perfect.
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Middlemarch
At some point, I'll be making my way back to Middlemarch, to savor the writing, but also to find out what else I see in these women, these women that Eliot created and fascinate me.
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A Wrinkle in Time Trilogy
L'Engle creates a cast of characters that I came to love.
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Kindred
This is a book that made me think, in good ways, but it was also uncomfortable and difficult to read at times.
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Salt Fat Acid Heat
If anyone says to me that they can't cook, this will be the book I recommend they pick up to learn how.
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True to Life
This book was my way back into the art world and thinking about art in a more serious way than I have in many years, not since my fine arts studies in college. And now I'm on the hunt for the next one, because it fed my soul to leave the digital world and be immersed in the art world for a bit of time each week.
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The Book of Dust: The Belle Sauvage
I enjoyed this book and read it for the surface level, choosing to go along for the ride and not think too deeply.
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Hawthorne on Painting
The book is made up of advice he gave to students as he taught along with notes people must have taken as he spoke about painting.
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Water Rat of Wenchai
Ava Lee is a forensic accountant who is also skilled in martial arts and goes after people to get money back they've stolen from her clients.
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Bridge to Terabithia
If you want a good story that will occupy an afternoon, I recommend it.
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The Stone Sky
Jemisin builds a fascinating world, one which I'm so glad I got to look into for a while.
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5-minute Sketching: Landscapes
What I love about this book is how much sketching art work the author shows from many different artists.
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Coming to My Senses: The Making of a Counterculture Cook
But it was towards the end of the book where she outlines how Chez Panisse came to be that fascinated me.
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Sketch NOW Think Later
If you have any interest in the topic, I recommend Daikubara's book, if for nothing more than seeing all his amazing sketches for inspiration.
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Manhattan Beach
Anna and her story are what sucked me in. She is stubborn, adventurous, and daring for the era in which she lives.
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Provenance
Somehow, reading this book right before the holidays was perfect timing for me.
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Hope in the Dark
Solnit goes on journey to find stories of hope, and to better understand how movements and hope work.
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The Essex Serpent
After finishing, I'm not sure I totally understand all that was happening, but I do know that I'd love to hang out with Cora and the reverend and talk with them.
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Where I Was From
Didion doesn't shy away from the difficult topics, but does so in a way that when she lands the punch she's been leading up to, I was usually gobsmacked. I'll be reading more of her work, especially the non fiction.
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My Name is Lucy Barton
I laughed out loud several times and paused to think as well. And I'll admit it, it was lovely to have a story read to me.
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The Last Magician
You know it's good when you stay up past your normal bed time to finish it.
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Accessibility for Everyone
But, as is typical and wonderful in ABA books, this is a short, wonderful read and worth it if you want to learn more about accessibility (which we all should) and incorporate into your day to day work on the web.
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Whiteout
It's a well written and illustrated story—highly recommend.
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Underground Railroad
The first several chapters were, in fact, very difficult and I almost put the book down. I'm so glad I kept going.
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The Obelisk Gate
The story picks up almost immediately where the previous book left off but the pacing felt much slower.
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Design Systems
She makes it clear, over and over and over in the book, that there are many ways to do things. You can be strict with your design system, or extremely loose. It isn't that you have to do things a certain way, but rather that you figure out a way to make it work for your team and organization.
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Over Easy
Pond paints a vivid picture of the people, the place, and the time period (late 1970s).
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The New CSS Layout
It's the perfect book to give you confidence and get you started on using the new layouts available in CSS right now.
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The Fifth Season
The advantage of being late to read a series means there is no waiting when I finish one book, I can launch right into the next. And that's exactly what I did after finishing The Fifth Season.
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Salvage the Bones
I learned a lot, I was transported to a completely different place, and I was often unsettled. That isn't bad, it's probably very good for me.
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My Favorite Thing is Monsters
The story went in some very unexpected directions, dipping into World War II history, the mob, and dynamics of grade school life, but it was so well done, it worked together perfectly.
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Butler's parables
I had to keep reminding myself that these books were written in 90s, not last year.
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The Wanderers
I ended up liking the book overall, the ending was worth it. But it wasn't a page turner, it was more quietly interesting.
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Castle Waiting
The craziness, the strange characters, and the fairy tale like quality is exactly what I liked about this book.
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Blankets
It's an incredibly sweet story of coming of age and dealing with your first love.
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The Peripheral
I highly recommend reading this, it's a fast moving story that you'll find hard to put down. And then we can talk about The Jackpot over a drink.
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The Incal
The Incal is an insane, wonderful adventure that ends exactly as a comic of its nature should.
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Lila
Lila is Marilynne Robinson's companion novel to Gilead.
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Upstream
Oliver's ability to talk about a dog, a snapping turtle, or an injured gull and help me see larger themes of the world in it never fails to startle me and delight me.
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Angle of Repose
At its heart, it's a novel about marriage and how disappointment, failure, and change are handled over the years.
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Little Dorrit
The class situations that are such a large part of the Dickens world are also interesting, especially since I think we do much the same thing in the US right now, just in much more subtle ways.
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What It Is
It's official, I really love the writing of Lynda Barry.
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Maddaddam
While contemplating those questions are worthwhile, the story itself didn't grab me as much. But I do like things to be a bit more tidy in novels and this book definitely wraps up the story in a way where I didn't feel I was left hanging.
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Syllabus
A book about drawing, the mind, writing, and thinking.
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The Year of the Flood
I absolutely loved this mixing of things, the way in which we learned the philosophy of the Gardeners and how that time served both of the main characters after everything changes. It's a great story.
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No Known Grave
I finished the Tom Tyler series by Maureen Jennings about a week ago (forgive me, I've been redesigning, so posting has been slow). It's much better than the second book, but the first book is the real star of this series.
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Housekeeping
And, as was the case with Gilead, Robinson's writing blows me away.
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Beware this boy
I really enjoyed the first book; the pacing and story were well done. But this second one is a bit of a mess.
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The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone
Olivia Laing is a fascinating writer, mixing her own experience with that of artists and her reflections on the city to create a book that is hard to quantify and describe.
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Postal
Another find from the library, Postal is a strange story, involving a small town where a sheriff and mayor rule the town completely and the mayor's son, who has Asperger's Syndrome, starts to wonder about some of the things happening.
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Daytripper
I know last year when I read Nimona I said it was in the running for my favorite book of 2016 and honestly, it was the best book I read. Daytripper is in the running for my favorite comic of all time.
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Season of Darkness
When a Land Army girl is murdered, he's sent headlong into learning about many of the things that are simmering under the surface of the small village.
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Oryx and Crake
And right now I find a bit of comfort in Atwood's writing.
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Travels with Charley
I'm so glad I read this book.
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More Home Cooking
I often stumble on authors who write about food, read the book, love it, and then find out that the person is rather well known. This happened with M.F.K. Fisher last year and now it's happened again with Laurie Colwin.
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The Real World of Technology
The Real World of Technology by Ursula Franklin is an amazing book. And it's made all the more amazing because the first two thirds of the book are lectures that were given in 1989 and the last third was written in 1999.
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Silas Marner
I've long been meaning to read something by George Eliot, and a few weeks back the author interviewed in By the Book mentioned Silas Marner and I knew it was the book I should read to see if I would like George Eliot's writing or not.
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Ghosts
If you want a fun afternoon read, pick up Ghosts and think about life and death from a lovely perspective.
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The Mushroom at the End of the World
There are certain people in my life that when they recommend a book, I usually just trust them and go for it and start reading it. The Mushroom at the End of the World by Anna Lowenhaupt Tsing is one such book for me.
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The Guineveres
The Guinevers by Sarah Domet was on some end of 2016 book list and I decided to give it a go, not totally knowing what I was in for when I started reading.
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Front End Style Guides
Anna Debenham started the new year off by releasing an updated version of her book, Front End Style Guides and I spent some time reading it and highlighting and remembering what it is I love about style guides this week.
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Swing Time
Swing Time by Zadie Smith is on almost every single best of 2016 book list I've seen. And I've been gravitating to reading fiction post US election, needing some escape that also may prompt me to think. Swing Time did just that.
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Hacktivist
Hacktivist appeared on a list somewhere and I decided to give it a try. I read it through my library and while I'm glad I read it and I liked it enough to keep going to the next volume, I'm not sure I loved it.
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Resilient Web Design
Jeremy Keith's talks are some of my favorite I've seen over the course of my career when I've been lucky enough to be at a conference where he's speaking. He's taken a lot of the elements of those talks and put them into a wonderful online book, Resilient Web Design.
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The final Earthsea books
Finishing a series is always bittersweet for me, especially a series that I've loved. On Christmas I finished the final book of the Earthsea series by Ursula K. Le Guin, and it was one of those series where I was wanting to keep reading more about the characters I've come to love.
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Exposure
It's a cold war era spy thriller, with a married couple at the center of it, caught up in something that they aren't quite aware of in the beginning. And it's wonderful.
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Andy Warhol: Drawings and Illustrations of the 1950s
I'm not a fan of the screen printing era that includes the Campbells soup cans, but usually in a big show on an artist I'll find at least one era that I like. And this show had it, his very early work in advertising is amazing and I'd never seen it before.
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The City & The City
I start a lot of books and for many of them, the books slowly draw me in, the first third is OK, the back story is building. The second third starts to get good and the final third is amazing.
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Tehanu
I finished the fourth book in the Earthsea Cycle by Ursula K. Le Guin, Tehanu yesterday afternoon. It is the best of the series so far.
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Comics: 4 volume twos
I recently was back on a comics streak, plowing through several volume twos of various series I've started, so here are some quick thoughts.
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Yoga at Home
The book is composed of short "chapters" where a person talks about their home practice. Some of them are well known and others I'd never heard of, most are yoga teachers, and they are from all over the world. The great thing about the book is that no two people have an identical home practice.
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The Farthest Shore
Another Le Guin book, I know, I know. But she is just such a great writer and this series is just so fantastic.
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The Pursuit of Love
I recently read a biography about the Mitford Sisters, an interesting read about six sisters and their lives in Britain during the interwar period. One of those sisters was an author, and I wanted to read one of her books to understand more about how she saw the world.
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Inclusive Design Patterns
I preordered Inclusive Design Patterns by Heydon Pickering when it was announced last summer. And this past week I've been spending time reading through the patterns and learning more about accessibility.
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Dear Data
Lupi, along with her friend Stefanie Posavec, trade postcards every week for a year with a data visualization on it of something they tracked in their lives for a week.
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The Crimson Skew
I finished the final book in The Mapmakers Trilogy yesterday. It was with the typical sadness when you finish something you truly enjoyed and you just want to be able to dive back into the world of the characters you've come to love.
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Who Fears Death
Lately I prefer to read fiction before bed, I think because I want to be taken into another world after living another day in our world. And I wasn't really sure what to expect with this book, but it surprised and challenged me.
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JavaScript for Web Designers
I'm lucky enough to work with Mat Marquis and experience his smart thinking in so many different ways that it was really great to see his ideas on JavaScript all in one book. JavaScript for Web Designers is a really great introduction to the basics of JavaScript and written in an accessible way for those who aren't comfortable with coding.
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The Tombs of Atuan
I loved this book, and I love that Le Guin wrote it based on the landscape of Eastern Oregon and that I know that because she shares so much about how she came to write the book.
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Berlin, Volume 2
I read the second volume of Berlin in just two days. Part of the reason is because I'm fascinated by history, especially the two World Wars and the interwar period of the twentieth century. I find it fascinating because so much of it changed not just those years of history, but the history of much of Europe and the US for years to come.
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The Six: The Lives of the Mitford Sisters
So when I came upon a review of The Six: The Lives of the Mitford Sisters, I was intrigued. These women came out to society during the interwar period and the six of them took dramatically different turns in their lives. Many of them met Hitler, one is a famous author, and several of them married either late or divorced early.
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Stella by Starlight
This past weekend I was hunting through what has become a rather long wish list in my digital loan app from the library. I came across Stella by Starlight by Sharon M Draper and spent a few days reading.
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Wizard of Earthsea
I spent the past week reading a chapter or two a night before bed from Ursula Le Guin's Wizard of Earthsea. I spotted this book at our local Powells and didn't think I wanted to read it, but then happened on it again in the digital library app and decided to give it a try.
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Urban Watercolor Sketching
Over the past 10 months I've been getting back into drawing and now, painting. It's been great for me, a way to do something that is completely away from the screen. And over that time I've picked up various books on both drawing and painting but none of them appealed once I started reading, so I never finished them. But this past week I sped through Urban Watercolor Sketching by Felix Scheinberger. I really enjoyed this book.
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Berlin, Book One
I've been on a hold list to get a copy of Berlin, Book One by Jason Lutes for quite some time. For some reason whenever I'm on a long hold for a library book I assume that it will be good.
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Designing Interface Animation
I've been spending time with Val Head's new book Designing Interface Animation: Meaningful Motion for User Experience and it's so fantastic.
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Practical SVG
If you've ever seen Chris Coyier speak at a conference, you know how deep his knowledge of SVGs is and how entertaining he makes learning about them. His book, Practical SVG, is no different in that respect.
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Lathe of Heaven
One of the reasons I love reading books by Ursula Le Guin is that her stories help me understand more about the world I live in. The way she frames things that may be completely different than Earth, help me understand more about myself as well.
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James Bond: VARGR
When I saw that one of my favorite comic book writers had done a series on James Bond, I was there.
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Lumberjanes
I spent some time on the porch this weekend, reading Lumberjanes and am so glad I did.
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H is for Hawk
I can't remember who recommended H is for Hawk first, but it finally felt like the right time to read it and it was indeed.
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The Xenogenesis Series
I just finished reading the final book of The Xenogenesis Series by Octavia Butler, also known as Lilith's Brood. It is amazing. So much about how she talks about humans and their innate tendencies is appropriate for what is happening in the world right now, it was so helpful to read at this moment in time.
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Using WebPageTest
In my continuing quest to learn more about web performance, I just finished reading Using WebPageTest by Rick Viscomi, Andy Davies, and Marcel Duran.
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The Burgess Boys
I'm behind on writing up the books I've been reading, but over the 4th of July weekend I read Elizabeth Strout's The Burgess Boys and it was a lovely holiday weekend jaunt into a family's life that was both difficult but so much like so many us experience.
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Time is Money
During a twitter conversation with some other developers a while back I was introduced to Tammy Everts and her book, Time is Money, so when it was offered as a free PDF by Everts' employer, I grabbed it.
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Patience
I read a review of Patience and put it on my library list and started a hold on it. I had never read anything by Daniel Clowes, but the cover and the review intrigued me.
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Chew
I read the first volume of Chew last night. It's another Colly recommendation. It is wacky, strange, weird, and any other synonym for those words you can think of. And I loved it.
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Alias Grace
Grace, the main character of the book, is based on a real person who was an infamous murderess in 1840s Toronto. Atwood based her character on the real Grace Marks, but there wasn't a lot to go on so she invented much of the novel.
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Madness, Rack, and Honey
Quite a while ago, probably over a year, I started Madness, Rack, and Honey by Mary Ruefle. This past weekend I picked it back up, sat out in the sun, and finished it.
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Palestine
Along with Local, I finished Palestine over the weekend. A really lovely and difficult read at times. Joe Sacco spent several months in Palestine in the early 1990s and he chronicles what he learned in the book.
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Local
Just recently Simon recommended a whole slew of comic books and I added a bunch of them onto my list and just this past week got started reading them. First up was Local and it is absolutely brilliant.
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Nimona
I know it's early to say this, but Nimona is in the running for the best book I've read in 2016.
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The Dispossessed
Le Guin, after reading just two of her books, is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors. She critiques so much about our society so well through the building of her worlds and characters.
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Small is Beautiful
There are a handful of books that I've read in my life that I can point to and say: “This book changed my life.” Small is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered by E.F. Schumacher has entered into that small group.
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Fatale
Fatale is an old fashioned noir looking mystery with a bit of an occult twist.
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Ms. Marvel, volume 4
Ms. Marvel is probably my favorite comic series ever (at least right now).
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Lazarus, volume 4
Not only are we getting to know the Lazarus better, the families better, but also some of the lesser people on the planet.
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Design for Real Life
Yesterday afternoon, on a rainy spring day here in Portland, I got under a blanket and read through Design for Real Life by Eric Meyer and Sara Wachter-Boetcher. This is an important book, especially if you have never thought through how the design of the the thing you are making can translate into many different situations and scenarios.
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The Bunker
I read my first title from Oni Press over the weekend, The Bunker by Joshua Hale Fialkov with art by Joe Infurnari. It's a great dystopia of the future going horribly, but the future is speaking with the present.
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Southern Bastards
I'm going to be honest and say that after reading the first volume, I'm still unsure about the comic. Comixology has the second volume for a pretty good price, so I'm considering reading it digitally or from the library if I do keep going.
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Market Day
It is an absolutely lovely story of a man in Eastern Europe in the early 20th century who's losing the way he earned a living, no one will buy his rugs.
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A Web for Everyone
As I continue on the quest to catch up on all the webbish reading I have started or stacked up, I finished A Web for Everyone by Sarah Horton and Whitney Quesenbery and it was a great refresher on accessibility.
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Red Sparrow
I've no idea how I discovered Red Sparrow, but I did and over the last week I read through the spy thriller. But I know it made it on my list because one of the main characters was a woman.
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Git for Humans
I first read a draft of Git for Humans before it was published, David Demaree asked me to read through and provide a quote for the site about the book. It's a fantastic book and I reread it yesterday to highlight and be able to do a review justice.
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Designing for Touch
Clark's well known in the world of the web for his passion about interaction design and in particular all the new and varied ways we relate to, use, and design for the multi device world we live in. In Designing for Touch, he doesn't disappoint with a small volume absolutely packed with information.
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Ancillary Mercy
The final book of The Imperial Radch series by Ann Leckie, Ancillary Mercy is a great wrap up, tying together a lot of different threads well. But I will say, of the three books in the series, it is the weakest. That doesn't mean I didn't enjoy it, but the story didn't capture me quite as much as the previous books.
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Ancillary Sword
I finished Ancillary Justice and eagerly put a hold on the next volume, Ancillary Sword at the library to be able to get to it as soon as possible.
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Ancillary Justice
I started The Imperial Radch series based on the review on Mandy's site. And Ann Leckie is a great writer.
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Gilead
As I read Gilead I was reminded of thoughtful, thinking faith. I was reminded of all the good things I find in many of the people I've known in my life. Not all Christians are what we see in the media, especially in an election year.
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The Golden Specific
Last fall while on vacation I picked a book at random from my library list and read it, The Glass Sentence. And as I said then, I really enjoyed the characters and the story. Well, Sophia and friends are back in The Golden Specific and it's just as much fun.
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Star Wars (Comic)
In and amongst my reading this past month, comics have take a bit of a back seat. But I did read the first volume of Star Wars and enjoyed it.
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A Tale of Two Cities
If you don't like lots of back story and set up, then I'm afraid you shouldn't read this one. It takes quite a long time to get to the meat of the story and the conflict and we don't find out the big secret until just pages before the end of the book.
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Goodbye Stranger
I've been scouring the best of the year lists over the past few weeks and my library wish list has grown exponentially. And, in my quest to take a true break this holiday season, I've been reading a lot of fiction that I otherwise may not read.
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Ex Machina
I made another foray into the comics of writer Brian K. Vaughan last week, reading the first volume of Ex Machina. It took me a few issues to really get into it, since there is so much going back and forth in time to explain the story, but overall I really enjoyed it.
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American Terroir
Over a year ago I started reading American Terrior: Savoring the Flavors of Our Woods, Waters, and Fields by Rowan Jacobsen. It's the type of book where you can read a chapter, put it down, and come back to it weeks or months later and pick it right back up.
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Going Responsive
Last night I finished up Karen McGrane's latest book, Going Responsive and if you know people, especially bosses or CEOs who aren't sure if going all in with responsive web design is for them, this is the book to give them.
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The Signature of All Things
I recently finished reading The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert, it was an unexpected read, as it seems all my novels of late have been.
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Latest Comics
I just spent quite a bit of time reading some new comics and I'm not sure I've mentioned all of them on this site, so here we go with the latest and some thoughts.
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Responsive Design: Patterns & Principles
I spent my Sunday afternoon reading Ethan Marcotte's new book Responsive Design: Patterns & Principles, much of it in front of a fire, under a blanket, gobbling up the words as fast as I could. It was a great way to spend a Sunday. And I'm grateful to Ethan for sharing his wisdom with us yet again.
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Captain Marvel
A few weeks ago, I went to the comic shop and I picked up Captain Marvel by Kelly Sue DeConnick. The author, in particular, came highly recommended.
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Burial Rites
It takes place in Iceland in the 1820s, when Iceland was still a part of Denmark (which I did already know since I work with a Dane), and is about a woman who is sentenced to die for killing two men.
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Injection
I finally picked up the first volume of Injection by Warren Ellis. I am a huge Ellis fan, as I've been working my way through all the comics he's written and I'd heard good things on the Twitters about this latest series so I was excited to read it.
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My Pantry
I don't know about you, but I like food, and I really like cooking good food. So I often spend weekend afternoons reading cookbooks. I'm usually getting ideas, planning what I want to cook in my head, and daydreaming about the perfect pantry and kitchen set up.
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Hild
It took me a while, I came back to it after leaving it, but I finished Hild yesterday morning.
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Dogs Songs
I am a dog lover, through and through. And a few weeks ago when standing in the Powell's on Hawthorne, I saw Mary Oliver's Dog Songs and had to have it. It's a slim volume, mostly made up of poems, but there are a few short essays as well. And it is lovely.
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The Glass Sentence
The Glass Sentence by S.E. Grove is a great rollicking adventure featuring the story of Sophia, the niece of one of the renowned cartologers of her age. The world has gone through a great disruption and it has thrown all the various places on Earth into different time periods.
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Etta and Otto and Russell and James
This was not an earth shattering book, but it was a really great story to get lost in as we began our vacation.
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Embassytown
I finished China Miéville's Embassytown the other night just before going to sleep. This was yet another book where for the first part I wasn't too sure what I was reading, but wow, the end grabbed me and I couldn't put it down.
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Low
Last weekend I finally read the first volume of Low, an interesting series that is set far into the future where the sun is actually burning up the surface of the earth, so all the people have moved into the depths of the Ocean.
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Hawkeye
I read the first volume of Hawkeye last night. I'd been on the hold list for quite some time at the library trying to get it. And now, I'm in love.
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Several short sentences about writing
Just over a week ago I started reading Several short sentences about writing by Verlyn Klinkenborg. This book is already changing the way I write, the way I think about writing—it made me want to learn sentence diagramming. Strangely surprising.
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The Paper Magician
I ended up reading The Paper Magician by Charlie N. Holmberg. If fit the bill perfectly, it isn't a great book, but it was delightful in many ways.
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The Girl in the Road
Yesterday I finished reading Monica Byrne's The Girl in the Road and, to be quite honest, I'm still sorting through what the book was about and if I liked it.
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Copperhead
I read some more comics over the weekend. A while back I bought the first volume of Copperhead and Saturday turned out to be the day to read it.
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The Martian
I finished The Martian last night. I'm a fairly fast reader, but I usually read several things at once, so it takes a while to finish things. Not this time. I started the book last Sunday, read two thirds that day, another 75 pages on Monday night, and because of schedule issues, finished it last night.
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Bringing up the Bodies
I just recently finished the second book in the series that Hilary Mantel has written on Thomas Cromwell, Bringing up the Bodies. It was a good read, taking the reader through the marriage of Henry VIII to Anne Boleyn.
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The Left Hand of Darkness
I don't know why, but one day last month I wandered into the science fiction section at the main Powells. And while there, happened upon a copy of The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin.
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Y: The Last Man
On the heels of reading Ministry of Space, I picked up a volume that's been on the shelf for quite some time after I found a cheap used copy at Powells, Y: The Last Man.
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Ministry of Space
I got back into some new comics I've had on my shelf for a while now this past weekend. I've been finding reading comics is my way of just unwinding and usually I love to read things that may have depth, but you can also gloss over that if you want. But I just read Ministry of Space written by Warren Ellis.
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What I Talk About When I Talk About Running
Many moons ago, my friend Sara recommended this book to me. I was doing Couch to 5k and I was also writing more, so it seemed a good fit. I finally picked up What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami a few months ago and I finally started reading it a few weeks ago.
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The Cairo Affair
This past weekend I read what I like to call brain candy. An easy going, entertaining book, that won't make me think too hard. Many times these are spy thrillers and this was no different, I hung out in Cairo with The Cairo Affair by Olen Steinhauer.
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The Gastronomical Me
Over the past few months I've been reading The Gastronomical Me by MFK Fisher off and on. It's a great memoir about food, travel, and life in Europe in the lead up to World War II, but I also had to be in the right mood for it, so I slowly made my way through the book.
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Alex + Ada
I chose Alex + Ada. It was the perfect choice given some of the things I've been thinking about this past week.
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Wolf Hall
I'd heard a lot of good things about Wolf Hall, the novel by Hilary Mantel about Thomas Cromwell. So I finally got my turn to read the digital copy from the library and spent most of last weekend devouring it.
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Rocket Girl
I'm a bit behind on getting my reading stuff up here. But while I was on the plane to Boston and back, I read Rocket Girl and it is fan-freaking-tastic.
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All the Old Knives
Over the weekend I needed a bit of a get away from it all read, and, as it worked out, my turn came up at the library to read the latest Olen Steinhauer spy novel, All the Old Knives.
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The Crossroads of Should and Must
Several weeks ago I picked up Elle Luna's new book, The Crossroads of Should and Must: Find and Follow Your Passion, and I started it and then set it aside for a while. I'm participating in The 100 Day Project and have been using my time to keep that going and some travel, but today I got back to and finished the book.
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FreakAngels
I know, I know, I know! More Warren Ellis, but I did say in the last post that I'm on a bit of kick with his comics, so I'm reading all I can get my hands on.
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Global Frequency
Last night was a rainy spring evening in Portland, so I settled in with a glass of wine and Global Frequency by Warren Ellis.
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Amy and Isabelle
I finished up a novel the other night by an author I'd never read before, Elizabeth Strout. A different novel of hers made its way onto my wish list for library loans some time ago and when I looked into it more deeply, I decided to read her first novel first.
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The Sculptor
Last weekend my turn finally came up on the library hold list to check out The Sculptor by Scott McCloud.
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Trees
I finished the first volume of Trees last weekend and it is now one of my favorite comics.
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Anatomy of a Misfit
I keep a rather long list of books in both my library wish list as well as Amazon's wish list. They get on the list through a variety of means, maybe I read about them in the New York Times book section, maybe someone tweeted about them, maybe I saw them mentioned in an article I read—but no matter how they get there, I usually don't get to them until I've long forgotten how or the source.
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Fun home
I read Alison Bechdel's Fun Home based on several recommendations. It was my first graphic novel with serious subject matter since I read Maus many years ago.
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Recent comics read
Here's the most recent comics I've been reading. It's been so fantastic to get so many wonderful recommendations from fellow comic readers. Thank you all so much!
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Ms. Marvel
I know, I just wrote about comics last week, but I'm writing about them again. Because I read my first super hero comic over the weekend, actually I devoured it.
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Responsive Web Design, Second Edition
I read the first edition of Ethan Marcotte's Responsive Web Design when it came out and just today finished reading the second edition. Ethan is a wonderful writer, making me laugh and keeping my attention, even when the division sign is used a lot.
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Designing for Performance: Weighing Aesthetics and Speed
I finally read Lara Hogan's fantastic Designing for Performance: Weighing Aesthetics and Speed over the past couple days. It's a fantastic read, along with Scott Jehl's book Responsible Responsive Design should be read by pretty much everyone working on the design and front end of sites today since performance is such a crucial element of our work.
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Comics, comics, comics
Almost one year ago I read my first comic. I know, I'm a late bloomer here. But since that first trade of Fables I've become a comic lover. Since I'm trying to record what I've read on this site, comics are no different, but since I don't really highlight from them, I'm just going to do a roundup here of the latest series I've started reading in the last month.
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The Manual, Issue 4
The Manual: Issue 4 lives up to the high bar set by the first three issues of the publication.
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Lucifer
2014 will always be associated with comics for me. It was the year I started reading them, diving into Fables and catching up with current issues, then the entire Sandman series, Saga, and making a start on Lucifer.
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CSS Animation: An Interactive Guide
I am woefully behind in reading a lot of tech books that I have purchased in the last 6 months. Between client work, getting ready to speak, and just plain old not wanting to always think about CSS, I've let things sit for a bit. But it's a new year and I'm back at it! Vicki Murley's book CSS Animation: An Interactive Guide is fantastic.
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Angelmaker
Angelmaker by Nick Harkaway is a great novel. The writing is magnificent, the characters are interesting, and I absolutely loved the mix of real history with some science fiction like changes.
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The Book Theif
Over the weekend I needed to disconnect and get away, so I dove into a novel. I've long had a fascination with World War II, so I gravitate to novels that take place in that era of history.
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Responsible Responsive Design
Last week, just before the holiday, I finished Scott Jehl's book, Responsible Responsive Design and it is a great book.
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Americanah
I sat down to read Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie because Mandy recommended it and well, Mandy's recommendation are usually always good. What happened while reading was that I got lost in the world of Ifemelu....
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John Adams
I am a bit of a founding fathers history nut, I really enjoy reading about that period of our history because there is such drama and personalities all battling it out to figure out where this new country will go. And my favorite founding father by far is John Adams, one of the reasons for this is because he married an equally interesting woman who we know so much about because they wrote to each constantly.
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Submergence
I often go to Mandy's site to find good books to read and the latest on her recommendation that I finished is Submergence by J.M. Ledgard. If you read either of the posts that Mandy wrote about the book, you can get a flavor of what it's about, but I would add that the writing is absolutely amazing. Ledgard writes amazing descriptions and it is dense, I often reread paragraphs simple because the words were so amazing. Another learning experience about writing while reading something that took me into two very different worlds than my own.
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Every Day is for the Thief
In the last month or so I've read both of Teju Cole's books. They are both wonderful. His writing style is incredibly descriptive, taking me fully into the world his characters inhabit.
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On Web Typography
I finished Jason Santa Maria's book On Web Typography today. Having worked with Jason, I heard his voice as I read, knowing much of what he was saying were things he has said to me before, but I am so grateful to have them on paper to refer to again and again.
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Open City: A Novel
I recently read, what for me, was a fantastic book to learn how to use words to describe things beautifully. Thank you Teju Cole
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The Gift
Highlights from The Gift
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tiny beautiful things
Highlights from tiny beautiful things
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Bird by Bird
Highlights from Bird by Bird
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Sass for Web Designers
Highlights from Sass for Web Designers
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A Pocket Guide to Front-end Style Guides
Highlights from A Pocket Guide to Front-end Style Guides
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Just Enough Research
Highlights from Just Enough Research
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The Library at Night
Highlights from The Library at Night
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The Design of Everyday Things
Highlights from The Design of Everyday Things
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An Everlasting Meal: Cooking with Economy and Grace
Highlights from An Everlasting Meal: Cooking with Economy and Grace
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Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers
Highlights from Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers
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Mindfire
Highlights from Mindfire
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Quiet
Highlights from Quiet
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Content strategy for mobile
Highlights from Content Strategy for Mobile
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The Working Life: The Promise and Betrayal of Modern Work
Highlights from The Working Life: The Promise and Betrayal of Modern Work
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The Art of Choosing
Highlights from The Art of Choosing
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Where Good Ideas Come From
Highlights from reading Where Good Ideas Come From