Recent Books -- The Danger To Be Sane, John & Paul, Remarkably Bright Creatures, This Alien Shore, How to Rule the World, Ode to the Half-Broken, West With Giraffes, The Jakarta Method, This Is Where the Serpent Lives, Politics without Politicians
01 September 2026
- The Danger to Be Sane: Creativity and the Eccentric Mind by Rosa Montero. Explores the connection between creativity and mental health, drawing on the lives of famous artists and writers.
- John & Paul: A Love Story in Songs by Ian Leslie. A very nice telling of the story of John Lennon and Paul McCartney. Gives great depth to their music.
- Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt. Some elements of a cute premise, but it reads like a 6th-grade-level book, like “Harriet the Spy”.
- This Alien Shore by C. S. Friedman. Solid space opera with a fair bit of cyberpunk.
- How to Rule the World by Theo Baker. Life as a student inside Stanford, with money and power and influence swirling around.
- Ode to the Half-Broken by Suzanne Palmer. OK i kind of am hooked on robot stories (robotlit?). This is great, along with the Murderbot books and the Becky Chambers books.
- West With Giraffes by Lynda Rutledge. A touching story, and suprisingly tense and suspenseful at times.
- The Jakarta Method by Vincent Bevins. I wanted to love this book but it took too long to get to the story of Indonesia.
- This Is Where the Serpent Lives by Daniyal Mueenuddin. A young man growing up in Pakistan tries to rise in the world, but is tripped up by corruption and his own ego.
- Politics without Politicians by Helene Landemore. Intriguing idea – we’d be better off if we replaced elected politicians with randomly selected citizens, ala juries. Hard to implement.
