Recommendation — Books read in 2023

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Below I present my recommendations from the books of 2023

Top 5 books (All Genres)

Presenting my biased view of top charts

Civilized to Death: The Price of Progress by Christopher Ryan

Have you ever wondered what do we mean by progress? Progress means there is a comparison, so comparison to what? How can we say we are better today? Is there a cost associated to what we call a good living? What are those costs? The author brilliantly opens up by asking if we are really making progress? Calling the current world a self inflicted cage on human race and a world moving towards devastation, it will make you question the base assumptions which have been drilled into the human brain to make an obedient soldier towards no defined destination.

Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol S. Dweck —

A great book that shows the difference between having a fixed mindset and a growth mindset. Both mindset play critical role in human behaviour. We will have a mixture of both and will adopt one of the two based upon the situation and the chemicals running through the body. It is important to understand the difference, in order to consciously override the default behaviour of the mind and change the mindset based upon the situation.

How the World Really Works: A Scientist’s Guide to Our Past, Present and Future by Vaclav Smil —

We talk about green energy and clean fuel, without understanding the depth of our dependency on fossil fuel. A book that delves deep into the question of how our society functions on the pillars of food, plastic, steel and cement and how each of these is dependenct on high density fuel to sustain the growth of the countries.

The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness by Eric Jorgenson —

A book full of gems. A book that packs wealth of information. Specially on how to generate wealth and happiness. “You start living life after you stop caring about the world”, “In the end nothing will matter” (paraphrased, not exact copy from the book). To understand these and many other such gems, go through the book.

26 Marathons: What I Learned About Faith, Identity, Running, and Life from My Marathon Career by Meb Keflezighi, Scott Douglas —

A book, which covers the aspects of how hardship has its own learnings. Meb ran 26 Marathon, each one of them was special, and every one of the runs had learnings associated, for himself, as well as for us. Written as a high paced story, it keeps hooked along with providing great insights for a person looking for them.