tarik2an

Not-so-engaging and perhaps confusing stories of Tommy and Tuppence. My main problem with this book is that I think Christie's detailed narrative does not suit a short story format, which makes the reader clueless and doesn't have enough time to enjoy the story. In addition, I couldn't understand most of the references the author was making. Perhaps this book is reserved for only loyal fans who read all of Christie's books.

This book is a translation of the ancient Chinese text Tao Te Ching. According to the introduction of this rendering, tao means “the way of all life,” teh can be interpreted as “the fit use of life by men,” and ching stands for “ a text or classic.” it contains 81 very short chapters discussing the nature of this world, as well as human relations.

At first, I was really confused with the sayings, as words and lines seem to be unrelated to one another. However, as I kept reading and not thinking too much about it, an understanding about the gist of the text dawned upon me. I think it's the repetitiveness of the chapters that eventually allow me to capture the meaning behind the seemingly confusing and platitude-ish wording.

This book touches upon many topics, but one of the most notable here is the concept of wu-wei. According to this article, the term means literally “no doing” and figuratively “effortless doing,” while the translator of this edition worded it as “creative quietism.” Either way, I could find no better way to grasp that concept than to read and feel out the words of Lao Tzu himself.

Of course, this translation is by no means Lao Tzu's actual words. As a student of translation myself, I don't think that any translation can truly replace the source text, the original. Witter Bynner as the translator might have let some of his own biases (particularly of Christianity and the West) slip into the text in its English form. In the introduction, he even admitted that he could not speak Chinese. Instead, he relied on previous English translations and his own experience of being in China for two years. That being said, the translation itself is beautifully written. It pays attention to rhyming and line breaks really well, and the vocabulary he used back in 1944 seems so contemporary, as if he only wrote it in the 2020s.

All in all, although with a grain of salt, I would recommend you to read this Bynner's translation of Tao Te Ching. I might even need to read this more than once.

I started reading this book merely to get some tips on building better habits and destroying the bad ones. Now, my word of advice is just turn to the appendix and read the step-by-step guide. That appendix, however, only describes you what to do. The author has said that there is no one formula to create a habit, and that you should discover your own way to build your habits. That is what the rest of the book is for.

This book contain stories that stress the importance of habits and why and how you should care about it. True to his background as a journalist, Charles Duhigg is a great storyteller who seamlessly combines powerful narratives of people both extraordinary and ordinary with the results of scientific research. Once you have read all the chapters in the book, then the step-by-step guide will be much more meaningful and compelling for you. After all, telling the stories of people being able/unable to change their habits is just as important as the habit change guide itself. They provide readers with not only the knowledge, but also the motivation to actually take up to the challenge of transforming their habits. This also means that the book is a very slow read, though (that's why I gave it 1 less star). I myself needed 2 months to get to the end of this book, but that's partly because I haven't had a good grasp of what this book really is. I'm not that good at remembering stories, but it seems that the author did a really good job at delivering his tales of successes and failures at habit-building given that I can remember every single story very well now.

If you want to change yourself but don't know how, then this book will offer you many glimpses of enlightenment and the much-needed push to do so.