This year, I started a challenge to finish one book a month. Because of being full-time on a startup thats constantly dying, I could not read many books in 2024.
Reading is something I enjoy, and I always feel like I started reading late, and have a lot to catch up on.
Therefore, one of the side quests, I decided on last year, which seemed doable was one book a month. The rule was pretty simple I had to finish one book a month. It doesn’t matter how much I had already read before-hand, I just have to close the loop and take some notes on the book.
The first few months were easy, I had multiple books in the pipeline that were more than 50% done. So the first few months was just ticking those off.
Once my backlog cleared, things became harder around May, where I literally finished “the mom test” at 11:45pm on May,31st. The second time things came close to almost-miss was in October, reading “The will to meaning” by Viktor Frankl.
Reading non-fiction was the hardest, as I had to take a bunch of notes, and I couldn’t read them more than 20 mins at a time. This made October really rough, because, “The will to meaning” is literally a collection of lectures. I had even read 40% of it before October, finishing the rest took me almost 25 days, with full focus on the last week. I almost thought about changing the book half-way through, but could not find any other book that I could finish in time.
I generally, laded on the book by the 2nd week, but sometimes I would make up my mind in the 3rd week.
Fiction and sci/fi were the easiest for me to read, although I wish I had more time with some of them. Especially Ted Chaings books of short stories. This is the best pieces of content I have ever read, will definitely be reading them again.
Finally, one book I didn’t expect I would like was, “how to get rich” by Felix Dennis. I thought it would be a trite biography with a list of steps. But it had that dark British self-depracating humourous tone, that I just could not put the book down. The prose is also super good. Even the advice was followed up with stories of something that actually happened to Felix personally. Would highly recommend to anyone wanting to start their own business.
Finished: January 12, 2025
Liu Cixin - (10/10)
Amazing book, blown away by the storyline and the science. Captures incentives and human nature well.
Finished: January 20, 2025
Neal Stephenson - (7/10)
A bit long winded and introduction of characters not relevant to the story. Lots of MacGuffins, that were probably not required, at least as far as this book is concerned. Will have to see in the next books though. Better than volume 2, not worse than volume1. volume 1 book 1 is the best so far.
Finished: February 27, 2025
Liu Cixin - (8/10)
Started slow, the last 1/3rd was amazing. The science is a bit iffy though. But great application of game theory. Not sure if the author knew about the rand orgs research or not. Sad that a few well known character die. Probably the first time, I ve seen a novelist kill someone who was used as a POV person.
Finished: March 22, 2025
Charlie Munger - (8/10)
Amazing book, a bit dense, and repetition of ideas throughout the lectures. Someone who has read Influence by Cialdini will find the last half a condensed summary of the book. The Good thing is the author uses those as examples of how to apply them in practice.
Finished: April 30, 2025
James P. Carse - (6/10)
Harder than expected. The book felt opaque until later chapters, when the idea of infinite games — especially when viewed through religion and culture — finally clicked. There’s something profound here, but it could have been much shorter. I’ll likely revisit it.
Finished: May 31, 2025
Rob Fitzpatrick - (10/10)
Amazing book. Usually most non-fictions, I believe could be a blogpost. Not this one, this one can be 10 different blogposts. There wasn’t a single fluff in this book, every chapter was useful. I would change the ordering of the book a bit. But I think the author wanted to give the most value up-front.
Finished: June 26, 2025
Andy Weir - (8/10)
A tight short story with a clever setup and satisfying math. I didn’t fully buy the ending, but the journey was fun and fast-paced.
Finished: July 25, 2025
Ted Chiang - (10/10)
One of my fav books, especially “understand”, “story of your life”, and “hell is the absence of God”. This is right up there.
Finished: August 29, 2025
Oren Klaff - (7/10)
Somewhat useful, but stretched thin. The core ideas, frame control, hot vs. cold cognition, and enjoying the process, are solid, but could have been delivered in a long blog post. Worth skimming.
Finished: September 11, 2025
Philip K. Dick - (9/10)
Much better than the movie. The book’s obsession with empathy, artificial life, and moral ambiguity feels even more relevant now.
Finished: October 30, 2025
Ted Chiang - (10/10)
Amazing book loved it. Every single short story was on point. Following are notes on each.
“The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate” 10/10 (great story on grief)
“Exhalation” 9/10, the science is a bit iffy but great prose.
“What’s Expected of Us” : shorter than expected, but loved the idea.
“The Lifecycle of Software Objects”, 10/10, aboslutely loved it, will revisit
“Dacey’s Patent Automatic Nanny”, 8/10, great idea, could have used some explanation.
“The Truth of Fact, the Truth of Feeling”. 10/10, again amazing story about langauge and meaning.
“The Great Silence”, 8/10, too short, but great ideas about comprehension, and what it means to be intelligent.
“Omphalos”, 7/10, one of the ones that was too loose. More a question of philosophy than anything else.
“Anxiety Is the Dizziness of Freedom” 10/10, a perfect short story, about free will, parallel universe
Finished: November 31, 2025
Viktor Frankl - (6/10)
Extremely dense. This reads more like a lecture series on logotherapy than a narrative book. The central idea, finding meaning even in suffering and the mundane, is important, but the delivery is heavy. I took more notes than I could reasonably synthesize.
Finished: December 2025
Felix Dennis - (8/10)
Far more interesting as a warning than as advice. Dennis is blunt, funny, and unapologetic about the psychological cost of wealth. It’s less a how-to and more a reminder that money solves fewer internal problems than people expect.
I’m increasingly drawn to sci-fi. Themes I like, are questions of meaning, agency, and intelligence.
A few lines that jump out in this review.
Meaning isn’t discovered once, it’s continually constructed.
Handstands on the edge of hell.
Will I do another one this year, 100%.
Full book list here