Books I Have Read From 2018

I love using GoodReads. Most of the books I read are either e-books, or audiobooks, and GoodReads is a beautiful place to keep a digital library. GoodReads has this concept of an “Annual Reading Challenge” where users can pledge for a number of books to read and gamify their reading journey for the year. Starting 2018 my pledge was 28 books for the year, pacing around two books per month. I’m happy to say that I was able to read 30 books, 4815 pages in total. Here are some of my favorites from past year.

The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable I like how this book is structured around a fable. The ideas within the book might be familiar for some, but the reading experience will be enjoyable for everyone. The book is about a company with a dysfunctional executive team getting a new CEO who manages to get things straight. This is a book for every team leader.

The No Asshole Rule Hopefully, you don’t face a bully every day in your work life. However, you might want to read this book to get ready for when you do. It was merely the title of the book which pulled me in, but ended up being more fun than that. It gave some interesting perspectives on how to deal with bullies in a workplace environment, and how prominent the issue is.

Ignore Everybody: and 39 Other Keys to Creativity The story of the author of this book is something I hear from most everyone around me. Everyone wants to leave their day job, and start a new company, do what they love, don’t they? This book is the answer. This is a book about someone who already did that and his suggestions. You might be surprised by the answers when you read the book :) No spoilers!

God’s Debris: A Thought Experiment Loved every page of it. Excellent thought-provoking content crafted around nice story-telling. You might know the author from Dilbert Comic Strip, Scott Adams. This book should be indeed a thought experiment for Adams. It is philosophy blended with science fiction. What a beautiful and rare combination. It is a short read and one that prevented me going to sleep before I finished the book once started.

Life 3.0: Being Human in the Age of Artificial Intelligence My favorite part of this book is the start of it. It has a beautiful AI future prediction story at the beginning, and that’s just mind opening. I wish that story simply was expanded into a full science fiction book :) The rest of the book discusses merely the effects of AI in our future. That part was ok :) Still, one of my favorites for the year.

If you would like to see the full list of 30 books here is a link to my Goodreads page. My pledge for next year is 48 books :) I need to go back, start reading now to hit that goal :) Join me on Goodreads, and see you next time.