What are you reading?

Just remember that Ayn Rand was a psychopath and a dysfunctional disgrace of a human being, and anyone taking her seriously should consider to stop damaging his/her own brain.

Reading her work is challenging. On the one hand, her arguments seem persuasive. On the other hand, we all know her ideas are completely unrealistic. It took me many years to process that.

When I asked my phone’s virtual assistant which should I read first: The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged; it showed me a thread from /r/books where a user implied TF introduces A.R.'s ideas and A.S. expands on it.

I thought reading the latter first would be like reading Adventures of Huckleberry Finn before Tom Sawyer. That’s why I was in a dilemma.

:scream:
Is it that bad? I am always looking for any beneficial ideas from the books I read(even if there is only a single one) and apply them into my own life.

Ayn Rand is a one note author. She has one core idea. There is no need to read multiple books. Plus, they are really long.

Her books aren’t bad. They make strong arguments for meritocracy, personal excellence, and accountability. But when you compare that to the real world, her arguments seem pretty dated, since they are mostly used now as an excuse for rich, powerful people to do whatever they want, because those are the ubermench.

Ok ok, I get the concept. I decided to go with The Alchemist. It is only 182 pages as opposed to TF’s 700.

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The Fountainhead is the best romance novel I ever read. Atlas Shrugged was sluggish the second time around.

Anyone who over-analyzes a novel could make a cult out of it. Ayn Rand beat everyone to the punch by starting her own. An obvious cash grab by an obvious capitalist. Anyone who takes a book too seriously is missing the fun. That said: Atlas Shrugged could have been much shorter, whereas The Fountainhead kept me for the character interactions.

I haven’t had much time to read lately, but I’m just getting into “The Infinite Game” by Simon Sinek.

I am 48% through Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist.

81% through the book.

I finished reading two books in one week:

Paulo Coelho’s “The Alchemist”

and I finished reading Neale Donald Walsch’s first book in the “Conversations With God” series for the umpteenth time.

After this I may be reading Abraham Hicks’s book again, and on the side, I can move on to reading the 6th book in the Dresden Files series “Blood Rites”.

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I do love me some Harry Dresden.

Currently I’m re-reading “The Andromeda Strain” by Michael Crichton. I just saw the 1970s movie for the first time, so I want to compare the two.

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I was just given this collection of 7 short stories published by Radix Media, FUTURES.

I only read the first one, but so far, pretty cool.

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Last week, finished reading The Complete Personal Memoirs Of Ulysses S. Grant, by Ulysses S. Grant.

I finished Crichton’s “Andromeda Strain,” so now I’ve moved onto Asimov’s “Prelude to Foundation.” I read quite a lot of Asimov as a kid, but can’t remember if I read the Foundation series. I was going to read “The Andromeda Evolution,” but couldn’t get access to it just yet.

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“Prelude to Foundation” by Isaac Asimov was fairly interesting. I’ve moved onto “Forward the Foundation.”

I prefer Bradbury to Asimov, but I can appreciate Asimov’s talent and influence on science fiction.

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I’ve read both, but I haven’t finished Foundation yet so I don’t have a verdict about it yet.

Happy Belated National Book Lovers Day to all!

What are you guys reading? :slight_smile:

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I just finished “Forward the Foundation” by Isaac Asimov. It was a bit of a slog to get through it, though the premise was interesting. I’m going to take a break from Asimov and probably turn my attention back to “The Andromeda Evolution,” the sequel to Crichton’s “The Andromeda Strain.” I’m usually leery of books that borrow an author’s name, but what I read of “The Andromeda Evolution” before piqued my interest.

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https://www.goodreads.com/series/59386-foundation
You earned that break. You finished the 7th and the last book in Foundation series.

Whenever I think about Andromeda Strain, I am reminded of the actor Kevin Sorbo for some reason…

…after doing some research I realized it is just a name similarity. Kevin Sorbo happens to be the lead role in Gene Roddenberry’s “Andromeda”. Silly me. :man_facepalming:

I’m reading the Foundation series in the story’s chronological order, not by publication date, so I still have five or so books to go.

I haven’t seen “Andromeda,” but I grew up watching Sorbo as Hercules.

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