{"id":2302,"date":"2024-01-02T20:02:45","date_gmt":"2024-01-03T00:02:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/?p=2302"},"modified":"2024-01-02T20:02:45","modified_gmt":"2024-01-03T00:02:45","slug":"goodreads-2023","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/2024\/goodreads-2023\/","title":{"rendered":"Goodreads &#8211; 2023"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It seems I remember to post about my reading every <a href=\"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/2020\/goodreads-2019\/\">second<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/2022\/goodreads-2021\/\">year<\/a>. I&#8217;ve been using 35 books as my goal for a while now, usually I&#8217;m able to read more but I have the occasional miss &#8211; 2023 being one of those years where I only completed 30 books. In 2022 I managed 36 of 35.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-2303\" src=\"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books1-500x419.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"419\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books1-500x419.jpg 500w, https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books1-1024x859.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books1-768x644.jpg 768w, https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books1-1200x1007.jpg 1200w, https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books1.jpg 1253w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 85vw, 500px\" \/><\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books2.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-2304\" src=\"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books2-500x421.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"421\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books2-500x421.jpg 500w, https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books2-1024x863.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books2-768x647.jpg 768w, https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books2-1200x1012.jpg 1200w, https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/books2.jpg 1261w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 85vw, 500px\" \/><\/a>I almost exclusively read eBooks checked out of my local library using <a href=\"https:\/\/www.overdrive.com\/apps\/libby\">Libby<\/a>. This is convenient and free. I&#8217;m not a very picky reader, so I&#8217;ll sort randomly in the Science Fiction category and pick something I haven&#8217;t read. From time to time I&#8217;ll pick an author I&#8217;ve previously read or one that I&#8217;ve had recommended.<\/p>\n<p>In the past my default rating was 3 of 5 stars, almost everything was a 3. I&#8217;ve become more critical and have started to hand out more 2 star reviews, as well as been more liberal with 4 stars.<\/p>\n<p>My 2023 books<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>9 books 2 star<\/li>\n<li>17 books 3 star<\/li>\n<li>4 books 4 star<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>What stands out is some of the best and worst reading experiences. A bad rating from me is subjective, the book might be good but it didn&#8217;t suck me into the story like a great book does. The 4 star reviews are books I&#8217;d recommend to others.<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.goodreads.com\/book\/show\/20819685-the-bone-clocks\">Bone Clocks<\/a> had been on my wish list for a while, I&#8217;m not sure where I got the recommendation but it has a 3.84 star average rating. Unfortunately this is one of my 2 stars this year, it took me nearly 40 days to slog my way through the 624 pages. There were certainly interesting parts in the story, but I never found myself wanting to just keep reading.<\/p>\n<p>Looking over my list of 2 star ratings, a good number of them were given to the last book in a series &#8211; either a series I read this year, or a sequel to a book (or books) I&#8217;d read previously.<\/p>\n<p>My first 4 star was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.goodreads.com\/book\/show\/840.The_Design_of_Everyday_Things\">The Design of Everyday Things<\/a>. It was actually the <a href=\"https:\/\/hackaday.com\/\">hackaday<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/hackaday.com\/category\/podcasts\/\">podcast<\/a> that turned me onto this (again), but that was the nudge that got me to read it. While it is one of the rare non-fiction books in my reading, it was well worth the time. I enjoyed that it gave me new insights into how things work.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.goodreads.com\/book\/show\/45734832-hard-wired\">Hard Wired<\/a> was another 4 star. I will admit it was a bit formula, but for me it was a page turner taking me less than 5 days to make it through it.<\/p>\n<p>Next up is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.goodreads.com\/book\/show\/45046578-otaku\">Otaku<\/a> with 4 stars, this was a surprise for me. I certainly didn&#8217;t expect this type of book from a former NFL player&#8217;s debut novel. It felt like it was set in a <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Blade_Runner\">Blade Runner<\/a> like future, or maybe <a href=\"https:\/\/www.goodreads.com\/book\/show\/6088007-neuromancer\">Neuromancer<\/a> is a better comparison.<\/p>\n<p>My last 4 star book <a href=\"https:\/\/www.goodreads.com\/book\/show\/28209634-autonomous\">Autonomous<\/a> had been on my wish list for a bit (since 2020). In this case it was a great recommendation and I&#8217;m glad I had it on my list. It&#8217;s got a lot to give: pirates, reverse engineering, dystopian future and cyberpunk. How could I not love a book like this?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It seems I remember to post about my reading every second year. I&#8217;ve been using 35 books as my goal for a while now, usually I&#8217;m able to read more but I have the occasional miss &#8211; 2023 being one of those years where I only completed 30 books. In 2022 I managed 36 of &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/2024\/goodreads-2023\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Goodreads &#8211; 2023&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2302","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2302","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2302"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2302\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2305,"href":"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2302\/revisions\/2305"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2302"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2302"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lowtek.ca\/roo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2302"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}