Wow, that’s great news! Thanks for sharing! I read my father’s version, so definitely older than 1991.

I just started reading The Moon is a harsh Mistress, I’m hope it keeps up with the hype.

I personally feel represented in at least three categories, so I’d say it does!

It’s already a day later! You got this, the hardest part is flowing by. How are you doing?

My little piece of advice: you don’t have to think about the future, tomorrow, next week, they are all far off. Think about now, this hour, the next 5 minutes, or whatever stretch of time seems manageable. What do you do now? Cook dinner? Watch a show? Cry in the shower? The future might be scary and too much to manage now. You’ll handle it when you get to it. Now, you only have to think about right now.

Verbena tea is calming and soothing. Lavender is relaxing. Green tea for me is a calming ritual.

You got this. Maybe it doesn’t feel like it, but you only need to do one step, and you got that one step.

For hard sci-fi I agree, but for soft one the difference becomes more and more tenuous.

As far as “best” go, I’m non plussed. Some of these I really liked, some… not so much.

Personal positive votes:

Perdido Street Station - absolutely loved it, great social commentary undertones while the story goes its own way in an incredibly vivid world

Fifth Season - great first book of a good series, good writing and good tension points

Saga - great art to match a great retelling of Romeo and Juliet in space, where all tropes are out the window

Personal “good but not great”: All Systems Red - fun light read, nothing more

Personal negative votes:

The Name of the Wind - it’s the archetypal fantasy story, with a lot of world building and little else, a Marie Sue as a main character and a love story with many many problems. I guess it’s there because it’s famous thus essential?

The Three Boby Problem - the writing is dry, the math is wrong, I can’t stand this book

American Goods - talking about dry writing style. And keeping the reader in the dark about completely arbitrary world rules. I did not enjoy it, often it feels Neil Gaiman writes to show you how much smarter he is than you. I will admit that Gaiman has been extremely influential, so I support it being on the list

Mistborn - page turner with little else to its name. The characters drop their life long ideals so easily to facilitate the plot, they are hardly believable

The other books in the list I haven’t read nor were on my reading list, most I hadn’t heard about before.

I loved its depiction of a complete world, where elements are introduced only for the flavor. It made it feel so lively, while destructuring the usual “Chekov’s gun” expectation. Most of the side stories also tie back into the immigration/discrimination theme that runs through the book.

I would wholeheartedly recommend it.

I never noticed that I also thought of “her”. I read the book a while ago, so I don’t remember your reference, but I remember finding it refreshing to find a robot that was “obviously female” instead of undefined therefore male.

Is the generation of wealth really the end goal, though?

On top of that, yes I agree that there are various declinations and modifications of capitalism. And yes, democratic socialism is still a version of capitalism, but one where the harshest edges of capitalism have been significantly smoothed over. Looking at Europe, they are also under capitalism, but implemented significant socialist policies, and the problems there are less extreme than in US. And still, this meme would apply.

You can’t skim an audio file, you have to listen from the beginning to the end. Audio makes symbols that are often used in programming difficult to parse or confusing. I… really dislike this

Same here: very far from top result, and links to this same article.

A lot depends on your mindset. In particular nowadays, we are constantly focused on the future. Everything is seen as a stepping stone towards something else. So naturally, happiness becomes a faraway goal: “I’ll be happy when that happens”, but as son as that is reached, a new goal appears. To be happy, you need to live in the present. Accept the limitations of it, and thrive on the rest. Not every situation allows for happiness, but most allow for at least some happiness.

I also think that humans are social animals, so happiness should be found in the connections we have with others, friends, blood family and chosen family.

I like it, definitely more politically aligned than reddit, but I still find it a bit empty. On one hand, I like that my comments don’t drown in a sea of similar comments, on the other there is rarely a lively discussion. So: mostly good, still hoping for a bit of growth

I think listening to a book is inherently different than reading. With paper-reading, jumping back is easy, as is slowing down and speeding up. But that’s close to impossible for audiobooks. Thus books that work well with audiobooks are books that are written too be read at a constant pace and not require going back on. I think novels for that description, but I struggled to listen to non-fiction and I wouldn’t try to listen to “hard” books either.

Personally, I can only listen to audiobooks when I am performing a repetitive task (mainly driving around). Otherwise I get distracted, either by the task or by my own thoughts. So I don’t use audiobooks much.

The Lord of the Rings trilogy, by Tolkien

I return to it ever couple of years, always in bad times and often in good times too. Everyone is trying to do the best they can, contributing what they can. Only few characters are at all malicious. Emotions are deep and powerful, portrayed lightly. The whole story is a great collaboration where wildly different people overcome their differences to reach a single, all-encompassing goal.

I was so disappointed I just forgot of its existence until now.

I’m normally pretty good about falling asleep, but I have a bout of insomnia a while back, I’ll share what worked for me.

Make it a ritual: every day do things in the same order. Don’t make it over complicated, but some 10 minutes to wind down by always performing the same actions in the same order. Example: brush teeth, select clothes for tomorrow, change in your pajamas, go to bed.

Write down your recurring thoughts (this one was particularly useful to me): if there is a thought that you just can’t let go, write it down and assure yourself you’re not going to forget it, you are putting it aside for tomorrow. Then the next morning read what you wrote and consider it a minute.

An a bonus:

The bed is for sleeping: don’t do anything else other than sleeping in bed. If sleeping is not happening, give up, stroll around a minute, and try again in 5 minutes. (honestly, this one didn’t work for me, but maybe it works for you!)

I enjoyed Neuromancer much better than Snowcrash, I have to say. I’m particularly blown away by how much it still holds up! It could have been written yesterday. While I felt Snowcrash aged more, mostly for the style.

Three fifth season is really good! I felt the second book was a little “less”, but it sets up the third book really well.

I haven’t read The Moon is a harsh Mistress yet, but Stranger in a strange Land is amazing.