Yes, Time Magazine has a list of what it thinks are the 100 best all-time nonfiction books. There is a fair amount here that documents the history of the 20th century as it was unfolding, which would be interesting to read. It is a fairly politically left-leaning (e.g., Howard Zinn), pro-science (E.O. Wilson) list, although they do throw in Milton Friedman and Barry Goldwater for good measure. It appeals to that small part of me that wants to retire, abandon my family, and just read from now on.
Tag Archives: books
Bill Gates’s Blog
New York Times has an interesting post on Bill Gates’s blog. He claims to read 50 books a year. That’s…let me get my calculator…about a book a week. And then he blogs about them.
this year I enjoyed Richard Dawkins’s “The Magic of Reality,” which explains various scientific ideas and is aimed at teenagers. Although I already understood all the concepts, Dawkins helped me think about the topics in new ways. If you can’t explain something simply, you don’t really understand it…
Some, like Randall Munroe’s “Thing Explainer,” are written exactly for that reason. He uses diagrams paired with the most common 1,000 words in the English language to explain complicated ideas…
I like highlighting the work of Vaclav Smil. He has written more than 30 books, and I have read them all. He takes on huge topics like energy or transportation and gives them a thorough examination.