#477

Its fun, and quite enjoying it, but if I could somehow go back in time and give it my 10 year old self I’d have absolutely LOVED it!

#478

SICP

3 of 5 chapters through. Possibly the best text on programming I’ve read. I wonder why I didn’t read it until now.

5 Likes
#479

Scheme or Old School?

#480

Chris Kresser - Functional Medicine.

A scary, but helpful insight into chronic disease/disorder treatment.

#481

Can’t remember the last time I threw my reading in, so - working on these two

“Coltrane on Coltrane”

http://www.chicagoreviewpress.com/coltrane-on-coltrane-products-9781556520044.php

And…

Next up: picked up Indigenous People’s History of the US and a couple short Bolaño novellas (“A Little Lumpen Novelita” and “By Night in Chile”).

2 Likes
#482

I’m not sure what you mean by Old School. :slight_smile: I’ve never programmed extensively in any Lisp dialect. This book might get me into Scheme (Racket). Regardless, the ideas and concepts in SICP are applicable to any language.

#483

I have both versions - lisp and scheme. Good old fashioned lisp is a bit rare these days. Racket is great, clean, free, useful… I should look at the book again. Rereading K&R right now which is… well… it isn’t as good a book probably but it is the bible of C, so…

#484

Books read in December:

Books That Aren’t Graphic Novels

Between Air and Electricity: Microphones and Loudspeakers as Musical Instruments, by Cathy van Eck

Cibola Burn, by James S.A. Corey

The Dragon Behind the Glass: The True Story of Power, Obsession, and the World’s Most Coveted Fish, by Emily Voigt

After the Flare (Nigerians in Space #2), by Deji Bryce Olukotun

How to Be a Boss, by Justin Kerr

Graphic Novels

Saint Cole, written and drawn by Noah Van Sciver

Doctors, written and drawn by Dash Shaw

Injection Volume 3, written by Warren Ellis, drawn by Declan Shalvey

She-Hulk Vol. 1: Deconstructed Hulk, written by Mariko Tamaki, drawn by Nico Leon and Jeff Dekal

Present, by Leslie Stein

The Arab of the Future, by Riad Sattouf

Black River, written and drawn by Josh Simmons

Jessica Jones, Vol. 1: Uncaged, written by Brian Michael Bendis, drawn by Michael Gaydos

1 Like
#485

Interesting. I thought all SICP editions were based on Scheme. K&R is great. :slight_smile:

1 Like
#486

Correct, my mistake. They call it LISP and occasionally mention ‘a dialect called scheme.’ Muddled this in my brain to being an edition issue until I pulled them both and looked.

#487

Currently reading “Embassytown” by China Miéville. Highly recommended “new wierd” sci-fi.

3 Likes
#488

currently reading The Gods Themselves by Asimov. i initially picked it up because it won both the hugo and the nebula and i like the first 100 pages or so but i’m feeling reeeeeeally lukewarm to the section that is told from the parallel universe. right now i’m satisfied to wait for it to come together, but i might bail.

next up is dreamsnake by vonda mcintyre!

#489

Just finished this one: https://www.bookwitty.com/product/97803494119030000000 (Deep Work, by Cal Newport)

Great read on how to get to a state of deep, intense intellectual (or musical!) concentration despite a world full of often necessary distractions. Practical toolkit for training your ability to go deep, and a useful set of advice on how to being building structure around you to support that. Surprisingly applicable even if you work crazy hours in an open-plan office or have similarly distracted conditions around you.

2 Likes
#490

Fabulous book. Unsettling. He left me almost shaking on some pages with how odd the environment is. I found it much more compelling than Perdito St. Stn.

1 Like
#491

Embassytown and The City And The City are probably two of Mieville’s oddest books in terms of settings and environment. Also the first two I read from him :slight_smile: .

1 Like
#492

yeah! Seconded! It’s brilliant; i started it yesterday & i’m racing through it - one of those books i’m already excited to reread & vaguely considering gifting. I liked Kunzru’s last well enough but this is something else. Secrets are told continuously at the edge of perception. Nothing ever goes away.

1 Like
#493

fun book, although I was sad to discover that none of my Kindle highlights in it are up to much - Language is rendered using images in the ebook, which made it display beautifully… but stripped all the Ariekei names from my quotations!

1 Like
#494

At my desk I’m reading, “A Brief History of Thought” by Luc Ferry and in the car my wife who acts as our audio book reader is reading out loud, “Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind” by Yuval Noah Harari (we share a car and hence spend a bit of time in the same vehicle every day).

It is only by coincidence that “A Brief History of” figures in both titles.

#495

“Hamlet on the Holodeck”
“Surface” Guliana Bruno
"You are not a Gadget"Jaron Lanier
The Audio Programming Book

1 Like
#496

Finally managed to finish ‘The Three Body Problem’ by Liu Cixin. Really struggled with this - put it down half way thru about 9 months ago and finally got around to picking it up again. Story was good, but think I struggled with the translation… Everyone else seems to love it, so not sure why it disagreed with me so much.

And just finished ‘Annihilation’ by Jeff Vandermeer. Which is fabulous - raced thru it in about 3 evenings. Kind of a slightly sci-fi-ish cross between Lost and the Blair Witch Project, but a lot better than that makes it sound!

2 Likes