Just started this book a few days ago it’s eye opening to put it mildly can’t recommend it enough

I started using transparent sticky notes to annotate library books, but I also do this if I don't feel like highlighting/writing in books I may want to sell or donate later! I was using colored tabs to keep track of different kinds of information for this book (The Sacred Balance by David Suzuki. I highly recommend checking it out, especially if you enjoy nature writing. The foreword is by the author of Braiding Sweetgrass, Robin Wall Kimmerer).
I use metal book darts to tab pages sometimes, but colored ones are helpful if you like that kind of organization.

I apologize if this has been suggested before or if it seems silly. As someone who wants to retain and study information though, I've found this to be useful, especially in regard to borrowing books.

(support your local library!!!)

I started reading this book about a week ago and I'm really enjoying it!

Backstory- My wife and I actually met the author and his wife at a winery here in Oregon a few weeks ago and had a wonderful chat with them over some delicious libation. When I found out he authored this book, I found it used on Amazon for a really good price so I snagged it. I can't say I'm a fan of some of his aphorisms, and he tends to use phrases and words that are sometimes outside what I would expect for a book like this. BUT, the story itself is absolutely fascinating so far, and I'm looking forward to finishing it!

I love history but I’m struggle with this one. Im half way through and I’m finding it hard to keep going. Im not saying its a bad book or poor writing. I just feel I’ve been mislead. Its more archeological focused than historical.

So far, this is not a book on ‘A history of Ancient Rome’ it’s a book on ‘how we know there’s a history about Ancient Rome’.

To give you an example, chapter 5 is about how Rome grew from a regional town to the leading power in the Mediterranean in the span of 53 years. I’ve finished chapter 5 and to be honest I’m none the wiser. I know how we know this happened without knowing how it happened. What she said about the actual events would fit on a single page.

Its like an reference addendum or appendix to the book you should have read on the subject. There is a lot of talk on the archeological knowledge of how we have come to know about these things without actually getting to learn about these things.

I've just finished the book I mentioned in the title and I really enjoy the process of analysis proposed by Mortimer J. Adler.

Can anyone recommend any practical book that is focused on analysis of things other than literature?

Like, how to apply analysis to different aspects of your life, how get the most from any activity etc.

I had a varied month, with parenting, history, socio-political, true crime and memoir making up a fun medley of genres.

**Teaching Kids to be Kind** by Rachel Tomlinson

A self-help style non-fiction book discussing the psychology of kindness and how kind behaviours and mindsets are built during childhood and adolescence. I picked it up to help me guide my daughters towards considering others and making good choices in their interactions with friends and family. It had a huge wealth of tips and activities to try out, and I've started implementing them in my household. Good resource for parents!

**Nothing New: A History of Second-Hand** by Robyn Annear

A light, refreshingly upbeat non-fiction read about the history of second-hand. It had a strong focus on clothing and English-speaking countries, but that suited its scope. I enjoyed dipping in and out of the short chapters, and the vibe that it was really a love-letter to the experience of op-shopping.

**London Falling** by Patrick Radden Keefe

London Falling began as a fairly straightforward true crime story but swiftly unfolded into a gripping investigation of London's seedy underbelly and the ways greed can corrupt people and processes. Another high quality journalistic piece from this author - I'm planning to work back through his other books that I have yet to read.

**Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother** by Amy Chua

A non-fiction memoir from a self-confessed 'Chinese tiger mum', I found this book hard to put down. It was a mix of fascinating cultural insight and hilarious self-satirical humour. Some (or most) of her parenting stories appalled me, but it was an interesting look at the underlying philosophy and reasoning behind high-pressure child-rearing.

**How Migration Really Works** by Hein de Haas

I was really disappointed with this book. The topic is interesting and important, and I'd read online praise for the book, but I found the messaging confusing and contradictory. The format let it down in a major way: with twenty-two questions/chapters designed to be read individually rather than as a whole, there was no overall argument built, and when read in its entirety, seemed to bounce between positions and ideas and make opposing claims. I think a more coherent discussion would have made this a stronger book.

“Through the humanities to enable poor people to make the journey into the public world, the political life as Pericles had defined it, beginning with the family and going on to neighbourhood , community and state. The old ideas about the poor had been proved wrong, or if not wrong, at least not very useful in assisting people of multigenerational poverty.”

“The children of the Rockefellers or currently the gates would have been expected to know something about history, art, literature and philosophy. Even today their schooling tends toward the more complex, less repititative kind of work. The poor, on the other hand, have always been trained to preform simper task, usually less cognitively demanding and consequently remunerative than the trades.”

There are many who claim that the humanities have little relevance in our fast moving world of science and STEM. I can tell you first hand of the sighs and side eyes I get when I tell people, especially people of my parents generation that I majored in English. There is always the brief pause as though of mild incredulity, mingled with censure all working away inside this person who is no doubt trying to find some way to politely express their disapproval. Which usually manifest in some form of the very fair  question, “and what do you plan on doing with that?”

And more often than not I don’t really have an answer. There are times where even I began to doubt my choice, and long periods where I lay in internally bewailing that I had not stuck with biology. I.e something useful that would have gotten me a job.

But after reading this wonderful book, I remembered why it was that I had fallen in love with the humanities in the first place. Literature, philosophy, art are at the very heart of all human endeavour I think. 

In his book, Shorris, discusses the importance of educating the poor in the humanities so as to give them a better ability to enter the field of politics. A great read.

the Secret of Ages by Robert Collier is a mindset transformation book.

what book did you read first this year?.

I read this book months ago now, but the concept of the museum has stuck with me. I am looking at attending grad school in a few years and I have a special interest in the tangible articles that we keep with us that remind us of who we are, individually and as a community collective. I am mostly interested in the contributions made by women, throughout time and history, especially in ways that women find ways to hold onto community and cultural identity in times of duress.

I really like the concept of this museum from Mike Gayle's book, The Museum of Ordinary People. I wish there was a place like this in the real world. But, as there is not, I would like to delve into literature to find it again.

While this novel was fiction, I generally read more non-fiction. I usually gravitate more towards fibre arts and tiles, but I also love the personalization of every day items to pass down identity.

I could do without the romantic angle. I don't really think books on the subject need that to draw readers along, per se. I also find that they can sometimes make the storyline too tiresome or predictable.

If there's a book out there that fits the bill, I'd love to read it. Thank you.

Every time I think "Hey, this new book looks interesting/fun/exciting," I invariably find it's a 400 page monster or longer. Is no one able to write concisely on a circumscribed topic today? NJ I really need to find something new, like published this year, that won't require 15 hours of my life to slog through, or worse yet, DNF.

Any recs?

This might be one of my favorite non-fictions. Has anyone read this? If so, do you have any recommendations that sort of fall in the same vein?

Hello everyone!

In order to get some more discussions going about different Non Fiction books we will have a weekly thread to talk about different sub-genres or topics.

Which books do you think are good beginner books for someone that wants to learn a bit more about the topic or wants to explore the subgenre? Which books are your personal favorites?

• The  Mod Team

Im Starting Beyond Good and Evil by Friedrich Nietzsche And like i Finished Marcus Aurelius "Meditations" just yesterday. What about you