“If you don’t have the time to read, you don’t have the time or the tools to write.”

Stephen King may not be the world’s greatest literary genius, but he got it right with this comment. More than this, though, reading regularly is one of the best ways to improve your own vocabulary, knowledge, and understanding of the world you live in. For all the opinions that I hear voiced every day, it pains me that more of my conversations aren’t about books.

In that light, on this page I’ll maintain a list of books that I’m reading or have recently read. I welcome any and all comments on the books listed here, as well as suggestions of any other books or writers that you think I might enjoy. Highlighted titles indicate links to my own reviews on this site.

(Update: I’m trying to get back to keeping this page current. I can’t remember what I’ve read!)

Currently:

• Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat: Mastering the Elements of Good Cooking, Samin Nosrat
• The Go Programming Language, Alan A.A. Donovan and Brian W. Kernighan
• A Lush and Seething Hell, John Hornor Jacobs

In 2020:

1. Eisner/Miller, Charles Brownstein (editor), Will Eisner (copyright)
2. Manga in Theory and Practice, Hirohiko Araki
3. The Drifting Classroom: Perfect Edition, Vol. 1 (manga), Kazuo Umezz
4. Manga! Manga! The World of Japanese Comics, Frederick L. Schodt
5. The 6 Voyages of Lone Sloane (bande dessinée), Philippe Druillet
6. The Drifting Classroom: Perfect Edition, Vol. 2 (manga), Kazuo Umezz
7. Gantz: Omnibus 1 (manga), Hiroya Oku
8. H.P. Lovecraft’s At the Mountains of Madness, Vol. 1 (manga), Gou Tanabe
9. Hitchcock/Truffaut, François Truffaut
10. H.P. Lovecraft’s At the Mountains of Madness, Vol. 2 (manga), Gou Tanabe
11. The Drifting Classroom: Perfect Edition, Vol. 3 (manga), Kazuo Umezz
12. The Room Where It Happened, John Bolton
13. No Longer Human (manga), Junji Ito / Osamu Dazai

In 2019:

1. Devilman: The Classic Collection, Volumes 1 and 2 (manga), Go Nagai
2. Permanent Record, Edward Snowden
3. The Institute, Stephen King

In 2018

1. The Outsider, Stephen King

In 2017:

1. Legion, William Peter Blatty
2. The Sense of Style: The Thinking Person’s Guide to Writing in the 21st Century, Steven Pinker
3. On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, Stephen King
4. Hex, Thomas Olde Heuvelt
5. Little Heaven, Nick Cutter
6. Child of God, Cormac McCarthy
7. Bird Box, Josh Maleman
8. A Head Full of Ghosts, Paul Tremblay
9. The Fisherman, John Langan
10. Ichi-F: A Worker’s Graphic Memoir of the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant, Kazuto Tatsuta
11. A Legacy of Spies, John Le Carré
12. Kitchen Confidential, Anthony Bourdain
13. Origin, Dan Brown

In 2012:

1. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
2. Foundation, Isaac Asimov
3. Foundation and Empire, Isaac Asimov
4. Second Foundation, Isaac Asimov
5. The Stars My Destination, Alfred Bester
6. The Constant Gardener, John le Carré
7. The Windup Girl, Paolo Bacigalupi

In 2011:

1. Room, Emily Donoghue
2. Freakonomics, Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner
3. SuperFreakonomics, Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner
4. Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury
5. Dog Blood, David Moody
6. Number9dream, David Mitchell
7. Dune Messiah, Frank Herbert
8. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Stieg Larsson
9. The Influencing Machine, Brooke Gladstone
10. Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Jules Verne
11. A Fine Balance, Rohinton Mistry
12. Super Sad True Love Story, Gary Shteyngart
13. Consider Phlebas, Iain M. Banks
14. Ghetto at the Center of the World, Gordon Mathews
15. The Name of the Rose, Umberto Eco
16. 11/22/63, Stephen King
17. The Prague Cemetery, Umberto Eco