Jonas

Truly, positively hated the Souweines and their PMC bullshit. Loved the builders though (even if I did feel a bit betrayed when they started warming up to Judith later on.)

Kidder did a great job not falling into the trap of sensationalising the subject. Just a very thorough, sometimes beautiful investigation of the everyday. Even I have to admit that it could sometimes be a bit tough motivating myself to pick it back up though.

Loved some of the descriptions of the island—the weather, flora, even some of the topology—basically the sense of space Golding creates, as well as the logical progression of things, and the pacing of the finale. Hated most anything else.

Now I'm feeling bad about having listened to this at above 1x speed...

This was given to me as a gift, and originally I dropped out about halfway through. That was before Scott Adams was thoroughly and rightfully canceled for being a paranoid racist, though—an event that rekindled my interest in the book.

While it initially styles itself somewhat as an autobiography, it falls squarely in the self-help category. And in a sense, this is as good as self-help gets. It's written by someone with an interesting life who makes his money writing funny comic strips, so at the very least, it's a competent and entertaining read. And Adams actually presents a handful of useful mental models on life and success and shares some outrageous stories. But most of the chapters either give off major pick up artist vibes or boil down to “sleep well, exercise and eat your veggies.”

Seeing how Scott Adams' own life has turned out, it's safe to say that all the “tactics” and “systems” in here–the ones he literally wrote the book on–didn't really help him in the end. So, in a way, Adams' behavior has inadvertently and retroactively transformed this book into a profound take-down of the self-help genre, I guess?

On a side note, if you have read this and still were surprised to find out Adams is a douchebag, I ... don't think we've read the same book? He's really not hiding it.

Finally, since seeing one of his videos for the first time was one of the cringier experiences of my life, I'd like to quote Adams' complete YouTube channel description. Because it's really all you need to know about him and the tone of the book:

“Scott Adams (famous for creating Dilbert) is a trained hypnotist, and is widely recognized as an expert on persuasion. Adams has emerged as one of the most influential observers of politics in the United States. His bestselling book, “Win Bigly,” teaches persuasion, and his bestselling book “How to Lose Almost Every Time and Still Win Big” is widely considered the best book ever written on developing systems for success. His most recent book is Loserthink, which teaches you how to avoid it. If you enjoy learning how to be more effective in life while catching up with the interesting news, this is the channel for you.”

My favorite part is that he seems to get the title of his own book wrong? What a loser.

Absolutely deserves its reputation as one of the best Captain America, and even Marvel, arcs. Brubaker's voice as a creator is perfectly intact here. He understands that to tell a good, serious story set in a universe such as this, you have to embrace its inherently silly aspects rather than ignore them, and then use these aspects to tell the story you have in mind.

This arc being almost 20 years old now, with much of its innovations permeating the MCU, it's easy to overlook how good of an idea the Winter Soldier really is.. He fits the pulpy spy thriller tone perfectly but packs some serious emotional punch for Steve Rogers, leading to exactly the internal conflict you want for something like this.

The art can be a little rough in places, but the moody color palette combined with Brubaker's great dialogue keeps everything grounded throughout, ensuring that the tone and atmosphere are always spot-on.

Finally, the whole thing is very well structured. There's no filler, and information is revealed at exactly the right time, so that even if you know the twists and turns, it still feels satisfying to read.