Best Books of June 2021
I got a ton of reading done this month. Between being stuck at the airport longer than expected and just finding books I couldn’t put down, I managed to read 2,244 pages during the month of June. A total of 7 books. That should help me get back on track for my 2021 50 book goal! Anyway, here are FOUR must reads.
The Midnight Library by Matt Haig
This book had such an interesting concept I sorta wish we could all try out. The larger lesson isn’t being able to try out every possible life we could have lived, but the fact that not knowing how each decision will effect our life is the living part. The Midnight library exists between life and death and each book is another possible life to try out and stick with if you’d like. This book came into my life at the perfect time. I think it is more important to make the wrong decisions in life and learn/correct as you go than make no decisions at all.
Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir
I am always skeptical of new books by authors who already wrote an extremely popular book. The pressure is on to make another amazing book, and I think that makes it difficult to live up to the hype. Andy Weir did an amazing job with this story. It will not overtake The Martian, but it was still great. A middle school teacher becomes an astronaut when all of life on Earth depends on him. He is put in a coma to travel to a completely different star system and retrieve the necessary goods to save life. Things do not go to plan and aliens are involved. The ending was not expected at all and I recommend if you enjoy sci-fi or liked The Martian.
The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune
A great feel good summer read that will have you wishing you were sitting on a beach. Linus Baker oversees orphanages at the Department in Charge Of Magical Youth. He is to Marsyas Island Orphanage to uncover secrets for Extremely Upper Management. Six children live at this orphanage- a gnome, a sprite, a wyvern, a green blob, a werewolf, and the Anti-Christ. Linus must go out of his comfort zone and decide if this orphanage should be closed or remain open. This book is full of chaos, adventure, and life lessons…please read it.
How to Take Smart Notes by Sonke Ahrens
I WISH I had found this book sooner! Holy guacamole is this an interesting read. The author looks closely at the Zettelkasten method developed by Niklas Luhmann. His goal was not to memorize information, but to understand it. He used a ‘slip box’ method to organize all of his notes and any information he found while reading. He would use notecards and rewrite anything he found interesting in his own words, number it, tag it, and reference it. So, he would write a notecard out and lets say it is #22. He can continue on with another topic under the #23, or if he wants he can connect it to #22 and call it #22a. He wanted to make sure he understood and could connect notecards at any point along the way. If this sounds interesting to you in the slightest, look up Zettelkasten or read this book. A lot to learn in a sub-200 page book.