This was an underwhelming book. I found the writing and characters to be the most disappointing parts of the book. The big ideas imagined and the suspense held the middle portion of the book together, but the book's starting and ending were particularly dull. The most interesting part of this story was the grand sci-fi… Continue reading The Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu
Category: Thoughtpad
Siddhartha by Herman Hesse
Siddhartha, in Sanskrit, symbolises one who has found the ultimate meaning. Herman Hesse's novel follows the journey of a bright young brahmin, Siddhartha, who is trying to find the truth. He has read the Vedic texts but is unable to understand the profound spiritual experiences it talks about. He realises that his teachers, and his… Continue reading Siddhartha by Herman Hesse
The Trial by Franz Kafka
The Trial by Franz Kafka is a novel that a friend suggested after I pestered him with questions about law and morality. I picked up this book a couple of weeks later to read it. It is a philosophical novel that follows the journey of a man called Joseph K, who has been arrested by… Continue reading The Trial by Franz Kafka
The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Brothers Karamazov is a beautiful book by Fyodor Dostoyevsky about three brothers. It follows their journey and the clash of their ideas. The appeal of this psychological novel is how the events affect each of the three brothers personally, moving them along in their spiritual journey. Some events shake their beliefs, sometimes they rattle… Continue reading The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Gulag Archipelago Volume 3 by Alexandr Solzhenitsyn
I have finally finished reading Alexandr Solzhenitsyn's life-defining series. Reading all three books is a big achievement, and I feel incredibly pleased. All in all, the series exceeded two thousand pages. If reading the entire series is such a big achievement, can you imagine how big the achievement of writing it would have been? The series attempts… Continue reading The Gulag Archipelago Volume 3 by Alexandr Solzhenitsyn
The Design of Everyday Things by Don Norman
The Design of Everyday Things is a lovely book that changes the reader's perspective about the everyday things we use. It is widely considered the Bible of Design, and the author Don Norman is regarded as the father of design. The book is easy to read and looks at the most common tools from the… Continue reading The Design of Everyday Things by Don Norman
The Gulag Archipelago Volume 2
I read volume two of 'The Gulag Archipelago two years after reading volume one. I believe this series is the finest literature I have read until now, demonstrating the monumentality of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's work. The book felt like the personification of the term 'the pen is mightier than the sword'. It was an attempt to… Continue reading The Gulag Archipelago Volume 2
A Concise History of Australia by Stuart Macintyre
Before writing any thoughts about this book, I would like to give a disclaimer. I don't know much about Australian history and reading the book only made me aware of how much I didn't know and didn't understand. Nevertheless, having read the book, I have gained a feel of Australian culture and perspective. The book… Continue reading A Concise History of Australia by Stuart Macintyre
The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells
This is the first book I finished reading on my recently bought Amazon Kindle. It is a short sci-fi book written over a century ago, in 1898, which made it quite interesting because the imagination from back then would come from a different perspective. In fact, there have been recent movies created based on this… Continue reading The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells
Man and his Symbols
by Carl Jung, M.L von Franz, Joseph L. Henderson, Jolande Jacobi and Aniela Jaffe I picked up this book impulsively, without much context about the field of psychology. I found it to be a fascinating read. It delved into topics I didn't know much about, and it changed how I viewed my own consciousness. The… Continue reading Man and his Symbols