humbled-boness

the winter of civilisation

fruits we'll never taste, languages we'll never hear: the need for needless complexity

emily dickinson and the creative solitude of space

the lost art of looking at nature

the bowl, the ram and the folded map: navigating the complicated world

ada limón on preparing the body for a reopened world

before it was 'bittersweet', nostalgia was seen as a parasite

why alien languages could be far stranger than we imagine

the fig leaf, benjamin shane evans

cat pianos, sound-houses, and other imaginary musical instruments

of shark moves, shell shocks, and trash landings on the moon

as bright as a feather — ostriches, home dyeing, and the global plume trade

getting ahead, jonas karlsson

do these florida dolphins have a language?

the form of a demon and the heart of a person: kitagawa utamaro's prints of yamauba and kintarō (ca. 1800)

who needs ai text-generation when there's erasmus of rotterdam

when memories from fiction become part of who you are

cafe in the mountains. hot matcha. new trinket box!

in a moment of impulsivity my friends and i decided to go up to the mountains for coffee. i already miss how cold it is.

Raffaella Cerullo + Transition state theory

"She was like that, she threw things off balance just to see if she could put them back in some other way." - Elena Ferrante

it's basically what human "souls" are made of (your consciousness is the result of miniscule amounts of electric charge jumping between neurons in your brain)

when handled incorrectly or encountered in the wild, it is a deadly force that can kill you in at least half a dozen different ways

when treated respectfully and channeled into the proper conduits, it is a power source that forms the backbone of modern society

if you engrave the right sigils into a rock and channel electricity into it, you can make the rock think

there is a dedicated caste of mages (electrical engineers) tasked with researching it in ivory towers

whatever the fuck Galvani was doing with those frog legs

look at this and just try to tell me it isn't a kind of summoning circle

It is 2024, and I am here yet again with my bookish hopes and dreams!

I did this challenge last year (available here), and in 2022 (available here), and I'm STOKED to do it again this year! As is my way, I have been planning and revising this list for some time. My Goodreads overfloweth with ideas.

As always, if you have book recs, please send them my way! And, if you're participating in the challenge this year, I'd love to see your lists!

Without further ado, I gladly present to you my 24 in '24 book list:

Sci-Fi and Just for Fun :)

1) Randomize by Andy Weir

2) Next by Michael Crichton

3) Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick

4) With a Little Luck by Marissa Meyer

Environmental Science/Ecology/Books Relevant to my Studies

5) Operating Manual for Spaceship Earth by Buckminster Fuller

6) Must Love Trees: An Unconventional Guide by Tobin Mitnick

7) Scientifically Historica: How the World’s Great Science Books Chart the History of Knowledge by Brian Clegg

8) Letters to a Young Scientist by Edward O. Wilson

Reading Around the World

9) The Eighth Continent: Life, Death and Discovery in the Lost World of Madagascar by Peter Tyson (Madagascar)

10) Everything is Wonderful: Memories of a Collective Farm in Estonia by Sigrid Rausing (Estonia)

11) Willoughbyland: England’s Lost Colony by Matthew Parker (Suriname)

12) A General Theory of Oblivion by José Eduardo Agualusa and Daniel Hahn (Translator) (Angola)

Rory Gilmore Reading Challenge/Classics

13) The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

14) The Second Sex by Simone De Beauvoir, H.M. Parables (Translator and Editor), and Deirdre Bair (Introduction)

15) Gidget by Frederick Kohner

16) Bel Canto by Ann Patchett

Recommended by Friends

17) Meditations by Marcus Aurelius (recommended by @hedonism-tattoo and many, many others)

18) Howl’s Moving Castle by Diane Wynne Jones (also recommended by many people now. @permanentreverie posted about it recently tho, and that was what really made me decide to include it on this list!)

19) Tress of the Emerald Sea by Brandon Sanderson (recommended by @daydreaming-optimist )

20) The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux (recommended by @kaillakit)

Eco-Psychology

21) Ecopsychology by Lester R. Brown

22) Against Purity: Living Ethically in Compromised Times by Alexis Shotwell

23) Radical Ecopsychology: Psychology in the Service of Life by Andy Fisher and David Abram (foreword)

24) Sight and Sensibility: the Ecopsychology of Perception by Laura Sewall

Bonus

25) Bride by Ali Hazelwood

26) Open Heart Surgery by Johanna Leo

27) A Short History of the World in 50 Books by Daniel Smith

28) Candy Hearts by Tommy Siegel

“Whenever you conceptualize social justice struggles, you will always defeat your own purposes if you cannot imagine the people around whom you are struggling as equal partners.”

The Twins (I)