Non-fiction Read-along Project
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| The books for our non-fic read-along |
Over at our Shelfari book club, Flips Flipping Pages, a friend, Shani, and I have announced our new non-fiction read-along project.
The project was born out of our combined geek minds, minds that like talking about pop psychology, technology, marketing, maybe a little philosophy, and other such nonsense.
Seriously, we just wanted to read more non-fiction and talk about it.
So, we've lined up the following books for our non-fiction read-along. One book per month:
- December - The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains by Nicholas Carr
- January - Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything by Joshua Foer
- February - You are Not So Smart: Why You Have Too Many Friends on Facebook, Why Your Memory Is Mostly Fiction, and 46 Other Ways You're Deluding Yourself by David McRaney
What was intended as a two-woman read-along became something we opened up to our other book club members, though people don't have to join for all the months. We're keeping it loose and unofficial (our official discussions fill up pretty quickly). We also said that even if it were just the two of us, we'd go for it.
Nevertheless, I'm posting this here because there might be someone reading this who'd like to join the read-along. I find that discussions are more interesting if there's plurality of ideas. So, you can head on over to our thread on Shelfari. Or, come to think of it, you can just comment here. I'm thinking of putting up a post after each read-along anyway. We can talk about the books there, too.
And, while we're at it, any other non-fic reads you'd like to suggest for us?
Comments
Does this nonfiction genre include essays? I'm quite not sure if Michael Chabon's Manhood for Amateurs can qualify, but it's... well, not that much of a good read anyway, except perhaps to a father.
I have some suggestions:
Philosophy and literature - How Proust Can Change Your Life by Alain De Botton
True crime - The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher by Kate Summerscale
Social commentary - The Missionary Position: Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice by Christopher Hitchens
Peter - Thanks for the suggestions! Will check these out. Have you read Mortality, by the way? Very intrigued by that.
Pinkadink - Yeah, will be rereading half of The Shallows, too. And since you already read Moonwalking, would you like to take point for the discussion there?
Angus - Yay, join! I've read his blog, too, but I wasn't a big follower. Very glad that he actually came out with a book, though, to compile everything.
You might be disappointed with Chabon's Manhood for Amateurs. But I get it: there's always a huge difference when memoirs are pitted against fiction (like Franzen's The Discomfort Zone vis a vis The Corrections!). There's just one chapter which is unbelievably good ("The Heartbreak Kid" is a tearjerker), but the rest is humdrum for me.
Re Manhood for Amateurs, will see if I can find a few of the essays online. As a rule, I don't like memoirs, but that also depends on who writes them. For instance, I don't really like travel books, but I love Bill Bryson's travel memoir A Walk in the Woods.