Currently reading (listening to): The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood. I’m literally 14 seconds into this, so I have no opinion yet, but one of you wrote to me after receiving your copy of The Wombanditos and said it was your favourite book, so I’m giving it a shot.

Last book finished: Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein. Once upon a time, I would have told you this was my favourite book of all time. That was several decades ago, so it was interesting to revisit the story. Published in 1961, it’s a classic of sci-fi. Some of it *really* doesn’t hold up (like the flippant, rampant sexism, the free love, communal ethos, and the long passages of pontificating), but much of this story about a human raised on Mars still works. But if you’ve ever heard someone say, “I grok that” and wondered where “grok” came from, here’s your answer. Very much of its time, and I think it was very important to a lot of people, so it is interesting to come back to after so long and give it another go.

On the pile: The Path to Power by Robert A. Caro. Caro is an extraordinary writer. I listened to his amazing, Pulitzer-winning tome The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York about the man who became one of the most powerful people in the country by controlling public works projects.The Path to Power is the start of his massive, multi-volume biography of Lyndon Johnson. I was three years old when Johnson became president, and I grew up in Texas, like him. He was an amazing, flawed, powerful politician, and I’m looking forward to learning more about him. The Path to Power is about his early years from the Texas Hill Country to being a force in New Deal Washington. Plus, if you’re an Audible listener like me, these books are loooong, and so, very good value for your credit (The Power Broker is 66 hours and The Path to Power is 40). 

How about you? Currently reading? Last one read? On the pile? Drop me a note and let me know.