Book mentions in this thread

  • Votes: 31

    Red Notice

    by Bill Browder

    Expelled from Russia after exposing corruption in Russian companies, an investment broker describes how his attorney was detained, tortured and beaten to death for testifying against Russian law enforcement officers who stole millions in taxes paid to the government. Illustrations. Tour.
  • Votes: 24

    Red Roulette

    by Desmond Shum

  • Votes: 16

    Crashing Through

    by Robert Kurson

    Blinded at age three, Mike May overcame his disability to become a competitive downhill skiier and a member of the CIA, and in 1999 undertook an experimental surgery in an attempt to restore his sight.
  • Votes: 15

    Breath

    by James Nestor

    THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER 'Who would have thought something as simple as changing the way we breathe could be so revolutionary for our health, from snoring to allergies to immunity? A fascinating book, full of dazzling revelations' Dr Rangan Chatterjee There is nothing more essential to our health and wellbeing than breathing: take air in, let it out, repeat 25,000 times a day. Yet, as a species, humans have lost the ability to breathe correctly, with grave consequences. In Breath, journalist James Nestor travels the world to discover the hidden science behind ancient breathing practices to figure out what went wrong and how to fix it. Modern research is showing us that making even slight adjustments to the way we inhale and exhale can: - jump-start athletic performance - rejuvenate internal organs - halt snoring, allergies, asthma and autoimmune disease, and even straighten scoliotic spines None of this should be possible, and yet it is. Drawing on thousands of years of ancient wisdom and cutting-edge studies in pulmonology, psychology, biochemistry and human physiology, Breath turns the conventional wisdom of what we thought we knew about our most basic biological function on its head. You will never breathe the same again.
  • Votes: 15

    The Timeless Way of Building

    by Christopher Alexander

    This introductory volume to Alexander's other works, A Pattern of Language and The Oregon Experiment, explains concepts fundamental to his original approaches to the theory and application of architecture
  • Votes: 10

    The Alpinist

    by Ruv Pal

  • Votes: 8

    The Overstory

    by Richard Powers

    WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE FOR FICTION 2019 SHORTLISTED FOR THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE 2018 A wondrous, exhilarating novel about nine strangers brought together by an unfolding natural catastrophe ‘The best novel ever written about trees, and really, just one of the best novels, period’ Ann Patchett An artist inherits a hundred years of photographic portraits, all of the same doomed American chestnut. A hard-partying undergraduate in the late 1980s electrocutes herself, dies, and is sent back into life by creatures of air and light. A hearing- and speech-impaired scientist discovers that trees are communicating with one another. An Air Force crewmember in the Vietnam War is shot out of the sky, then saved by falling into a banyan. This is the story of these and five other strangers, each summoned in different ways by the natural world, who are brought together in a last stand to save it from catastrophe. ‘Breathtaking’ Barbara Kingsolver, New York Times ‘It’s a masterpiece’ Tim Winton ‘It’s not possible for Powers to write an uninteresting book’ Margaret Atwood ‘An astonishing performance’ Benjamin Markovits, Guardian
  • Votes: 6

    The Spy and the Traitor

    by Ben Macintyre

  • Votes: 6

    Say Nothing

    by Patrick Radden Keefe

    "A narrative about a notorious killing that took place in Northern Ireland during The Troubles and its devastating repercussions to this day"--
  • Votes: 6

    The Devil in the White City

    by Erik Larson

    'An irresistible page-turner that reads like the most compelling, sleep defying fiction' TIME OUT One was an architect. The other a serial killer. This is the incredible story of these two men and their realization of the Chicago World's Fair of 1893, and its amazing 'White City'; one of the wonders of the world. The architect was Daniel H. Burnham, the driving force behind the White City, the massive, visionary landscape of white buildings set in a wonderland of canals and gardens. The killer was H. H. Holmes, a handsome doctor with striking blue eyes. He used the attraction of the great fair - and his own devilish charms - to lure scores of young women to their deaths. While Burnham overcame politics, infighting, personality clashes and Chicago's infamous weather to transform the swamps of Jackson Park into the greatest show on Earth, Holmes built his own edifice just west of the fairground. He called it the World's Fair Hotel. In reality it was a torture palace, a gas chamber, a crematorium. These two disparate but driven men are brought to life in this mesmerizing, murderous tale of the legendary Fair that transformed America and set it on course for the twentieth century . . .
  • Votes: 5

    Station Eleven

    by Emily St. John Mandel

  • Votes: 4

    Find Your People

    by Jennie Allen

  • Votes: 4

    A Pattern Language

    by Christopher Alexander

    Two hundred and fifty-three archetypal patterns consisting of problem statements, discussions, illustrations, and solutions provide lay persons with a framework for engaging in architectural design
  • Votes: 4

    Rocket Men

    by Robert Kurson

    Shares the inside story of the dangerous Apollo 8 mission, focusing on the lives of astronaut heroes Frank Borman, Jim Lovell, and Bill Anders, while illuminating the political factors that prompted the decision to risk lives to save the Apollo program and define the space race.
  • Votes: 4

    Shadow Divers

    by Robert Kurson

    Recounts the 1991 discovery of a sunken German U-boat by two recreational scuba divers, tracing how they devoted the following six years to researching the identities of the submarine and its crew, correcting historical texts, and breaking new grounds in the world of diving along the way. Reprint. 200,000 first printing.
  • Votes: 4

    Unreal

    by Cindy Gunderson

  • Votes: 3

    Battle Mage

    by Peter Flannery

  • Votes: 3

    Amp It Up

    by Frank Slootman

  • Votes: 3

    The Storyteller

    by Dave Grohl

  • Votes: 3

    Barbarian Days

    by William Finnegan

    Surfing only looks like a sport. To initiates, it is something else entirely: a beautiful addiction, a demanding course of study, a morally dangerous pastime, a way of life. Raised in California and Hawaii, Finnegan started surfing as a child. He has chased waves all over the world, wandering for years through the South Pacific, Australia, Asia, Africa. A bookish boy, and then an excessively adventurous young man, he went on to become a writer and war reporter. Barbarian Days takes us deep into unfamiliar worlds, some of them right under our noses -- off the coasts of New York and San Francisco. It immerses the reader in the edgy camaraderie of close male friendships annealed in challenging waves.
  • Votes: 3

    Be Dazzled

    by Ryan La Sala

  • Votes: 3

    Entangled Life

    by Merlin Sheldrake

    *THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER* *A NEW STATESMAN, DAILY TELEGRAPH, THE TIMES, BBC SCIENCE FOCUS, EVENING STANDARD, MAIL ON SUNDAY AND SUNDAY TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 2020* 'A dazzling, vibrant, vision-changing book. I ended it wonderstruck at the fungal world. A remarkable work by a remarkable writer' Robert Macfarlane The more we learn about fungi, the less makes sense without them. Neither plant nor animal, they are found throughout the earth, the air and our bodies. They can be microscopic, yet also account for the largest organisms ever recorded. They enabled the first life on land, can survive unprotected in space and thrive amidst nuclear radiation. In fact, nearly all life relies in some way on fungi. These endlessly surprising organisms have no brain but can solve problems and manipulate animal behaviour with devastating precision. In giving us bread, alcohol and life-saving medicines, fungi have shaped human history, and their psychedelic properties have recently been shown to alleviate a number of mental illnesses. Their ability to digest plastic, explosives, pesticides and crude oil is being harnessed in break-through technologies, and the discovery that they connect plants in underground networks, the 'Wood Wide Web', is transforming the way we understand ecosystems. Yet over ninety percent of their species remain undocumented. Entangled Life is a mind-altering journey into a spectacular and neglected world, and shows that fungi provide a key to understanding both the planet on which we live, and life itself. 'Reads like an adventure story ... wondrous ... beguilingly weaves together lived experience and scientific research' Sunday Times 'An astonishing book that could alter our perceptions of fungi for ever. It seems somehow to tip the natural world upside down' Observer 'Dazzling ... reveals a world that's both more extraordinary and more delicate than could be imagined' Daily Mail
  • Votes: 3

    Finding the Mother Tree

    by Suzanne Simard

  • Votes: 3

    Indian Givers

    by Jack Weatherford

  • Votes: 3

    Numbers Don't Lie

    by Vaclav Smil

    "Vaclav Smil's mission is to make facts matter. An environmental scientist, policy analyst, and a hugely prolific author, he is Bill Gates' go-to guy for making sense of our world. In Numbers Don't Lie, Smil answers questions such as: What's worse for the environment--your car or your phone? How much do the world's cows weigh (and what does it matter)? And what makes people happy?"--
  • Votes: 3

    The First Tycoon

    by T.J. Stiles

    NATIONAL BESTSELLER WINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD In this groundbreaking biography, T.J. Stiles tells the dramatic story of Cornelius “Commodore” Vanderbilt, the combative man and American icon who, through his genius and force of will, did more than perhaps any other individual to create modern capitalism. Meticulously researched and elegantly written, The First Tycoon describes an improbable life, from Vanderbilt’s humble birth during the presidency of George Washington to his death as one of the richest men in American history. In between we see how the Commodore helped to launch the transportation revolution, propel the Gold Rush, reshape Manhattan, and invent the modern corporation. Epic in its scope and success, the life of Vanderbilt is also the story of the rise of America itself.
  • Votes: 2

    Behave

    by Robert M. Sapolsky

  • Votes: 2

    Deep Survival

    by Laurence Gonzales

  • Votes: 2

    Hero of Two Worlds

    by Mike Duncan

  • Votes: 2

    The Case Against Reality

    by Donald D. Hoffman

  • Votes: 2

    How Google Works

    by Eric Schmidt

  • Votes: 2

    The Three-Body Problem (Remembrance of Earth's Past (1))

    by Cixin Liu

    Set against the backdrop of China's Cultural Revolution, a secret military project's signal is received by an alien civilization on the brink of destruction, which plans to invade Earth; meanwhile, on Earth, different camps start forming, planning to either welcome the superior beings and help them take over a world seen as corrupt, or to fight against the invasion.
  • Votes: 2

    Play Nice But Win

    by Michael Dell

    From Michael Dell, renowned founder and chief executive of one of America’s largest technology companies, the inside story of the battles that defined him as a leader In 1984, soon-to-be college dropout Michael Dell hid signs of his fledgling PC business in the bathroom of his University of Texas dorm room. Almost 30 years later, at the pinnacle of his success as founder and leader of Dell Technologies, he found himself embroiled in a battle for his company’s survival. What he’d do next could ensure its legacy—or destroy it completely. Play Nice But Win is a riveting account of the three battles waged for Dell Technologies: one to launch it, one to keep it, and one to transform it. For the first time, Dell reveals the highs and lows of the company's evolution amidst a rapidly changing industry—and his own, as he matured into the CEO it needed. With humor and humility, he recalls the mentors who showed him how to turn his passion into a business; the competitors who became friends, foes, or both; and the sharks that circled, looking for weakness. What emerges is the long-term vision underpinning his success: that technology is ultimately about people and their potential. More than an honest portrait of a leader at a crossroads, Play Nice But Win is a survival story proving that while anyone with technological insight and entrepreneurial zeal might build something great—it takes a leader to build something that lasts.
  • Votes: 2

    Intro Stats

    by Richard De Veaux

  • Votes: 2

    House of Worth

    by Chantal Trubert-Tollu

  • Votes: 1

    Behind the Bastards

    by iHeartPodcasts

  • Votes: 1

    Blood Meridian

    by Cormac McCarthy

  • Votes: 1

    Breath from Salt

    by Bijal P. Trivedi

    Science writer Bijal Trivedi gives a comprehensive look at Cystic Fibrosis, starting with one revolutionary case in the 70s that prompted a wave of change and leading up to the present, and the way treatments for the previously fatal disease are opening the door for curing other life-threatening conditions.
  • Votes: 1

    Civilization and the Culture of Science

    by Stephen Gaukroger

  • Votes: 1

    Dishonest Money

    by Joseph Plummer

  • Votes: 1

    Crossroads

    by Jonathan Franzen

  • Votes: 1

    Pedro Páramo

    by Juan Rulfo

  • Votes: 1

    Project Hail Mary

    by Andy Weir

  • Votes: 1

    Star Maker

    by Olaf Stapledon

    This 1937 successor to Last and First Men offers another entrancing speculative history of the future. Cited as a key influence by science-fiction masters such as Doris Lessing, its bold exploration of the cosmos ventures into intelligent star clusters and mingles among alien races for a memorable vision of infinity.
  • Votes: 1

    Stuff To Blow Your Mind

    by iHeartPodcasts

  • Votes: 1

    The Almanack of Naval Ravikant

    by Eric Jorgenson

    Getting rich is not just about luck; happiness is not just a trait we are born with. These aspirations may seem out of reach, but building wealth and being happy are skills we can learn. So what are these skills, and how do we learn them? What are the principles that should guide our efforts? What does progress really look like? Naval Ravikant is an entrepreneur, philosopher, and investor who has captivated the world with his principles for building wealth and creating long-term happiness. The Almanack of Naval Ravikant is a collection of Naval's wisdom and experience from the last ten years, shared as a curation of his most insightful interviews and poignant reflections. This isn't a how-to book, or a step-by-step gimmick. Instead, through Naval's own words, you will learn how to walk your own unique path toward a happier, wealthier life.
  • Votes: 1

    The Cloud of Unknowing

    by Anonymous

  • Votes: 1

    The Order of Time

    by Carlo Rovelli

    'A dazzling book ... the new Stephen Hawking' Sunday Times The bestselling author of Seven Brief Lessons on Physics takes us on an enchanting, consoling journey to discover the meaning of time 'We are time. We are this space, this clearing opened by the traces of memory inside the connections between our neurons. We are memory. We are nostalgia. We are longing for a future that will not come.' Time is a mystery that does not cease to puzzle us. Philosophers, artists and poets have long explored its meaning while scientists have found that its structure is different from the simple intuition we have of it. From Boltzmann to quantum theory, from Einstein to loop quantum gravity, our understanding of time has been undergoing radical transformations. Time flows at a different speed in different places, the past and the future differ far less than we might think, and the very notion of the present evaporates in the vast universe. With his extraordinary charm and sense of wonder, bringing together science, philosophy and art, Carlo Rovelli unravels this mystery. Enlightening and consoling, The Order of Time shows that to understand ourselves we need to reflect on time -- and to understand time we need to reflect on ourselves. Translated by Simon Carnell and Erica Segre
  • Votes: 1

    The Prophet

    by Kahlil Gibran

  • Votes: 1

    The Twilight Struggle

    by Hal Brands

  • Votes: 1

    This Guy

    by Jamie Ferguson