Our Reads of 2025

Discussion in 'Books' started by Ismitje, Jan 1, 2025.

  1. bigredfutbol

    bigredfutbol Moderator
    Staff Member

    Sep 5, 2000
    Woodbridge, VA
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    #201 bigredfutbol, Jun 9, 2025
    Last edited: Jun 13, 2025
    The past few years, I’ve read or re-read at least one Faulkner novel every summer.
    This year (so far) it was Pylon.

    He wrote it quickly while struggling with Absalom, Absolam! and it was based on his own experience flying in New Orleans. Minor work in the canon but he was firing on all cylinders in the mid-30’s so it’s definitely worth checking out.
     
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  2. TheJoeGreene

    TheJoeGreene Member+

    Aug 19, 2012
    The Lubbock Texas
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    Germany
    While you're at it, you might want to add "The History of Physical Culture" by Conor Heffernan. He details the full history of the idea and includes a discussion of Eugen Sandow in it. Heffernan did a podcast interview about the book with Brett McKay last year that was really interesting.
     
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  3. chaski

    chaski Moderator
    Staff Member

    Mar 20, 2000
    redacted
    Club:
    Lisburn Distillery FC
    Nat'l Team:
    Guam
    It Looked Like Forever – Mark Harris

    [​IMG]

    The fourth and final Henry Wiggens book.

    “Oh, that big future. I should of enjoyed it more while I was doing it. Instead, I was always looking ahead, and now the future is the past.”
     
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  4. Ismitje

    Ismitje Super Moderator

    Dec 30, 2000
    The Palouse
    Club:
    Real Salt Lake
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Some subjects I am interested in but not enough to take a deep dive, and for those, a book by a columnist/blogger (as opposed to an investigative journalist or subject expert) can often hit the mark. Case in point: Amanda Martell's Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism. In four sections, she briefly death cults, controlling religions, MLMs, and workout influencers in turn, with the bulk of each section given over to consideration of the kind of language each one uses to craft unity and then absolute loyalty.

    upload_2025-6-9_20-52-5.jpeg
    Side note: for some fields, I think no education is necessarily required to be considered a specialist in something, for others, a bachelors, others a masters, and some a doctorate. "Linguist" is one I would expect - like "Economist" or "Historian" - to refer to someone with an advanced degree (unlike, say, an accountant (BA) or farmer (none). Montell has a BA in linguistics from NYU but that seems to fall short (to me) of what makes one a linguist? My own bias is showing.
     
  5. Dr. Wankler

    Dr. Wankler Member+

    May 2, 2001
    The Electric City
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    I would agree. However, exercise influencers are a thing I follow (mostly to make sure my bullshit detector is fully functioning), AND the book is available on Kindle Unlimited, so I'll be checking it out.
     
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  6. xtomx

    xtomx Member+

    Chicago Fire
    Sep 6, 2001
    Northern Wisconsin, but not far from civilization
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    I just added the audiobook to my Libby account at the library.
    Looks like something interesting, but not interesting enough to actually purchase.
     
  7. Ismitje

    Ismitje Super Moderator

    Dec 30, 2000
    The Palouse
    Club:
    Real Salt Lake
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Maud is perhaps an unlikely serial killer - 88 years old and so not as adventurous as others - but she's an effective one. This series of five short stories set in Sweden is pretty fun, and somehow you root for Maud. An Elderly Lady Is Up To No Good, by Helene Tursten.

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  8. chaski

    chaski Moderator
    Staff Member

    Mar 20, 2000
    redacted
    Club:
    Lisburn Distillery FC
    Nat'l Team:
    Guam
    Alburquerque – Rudolfo Anaya

    [​IMG]

    :thumbsup::thumbsup:
     
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  9. xtomx

    xtomx Member+

    Chicago Fire
    Sep 6, 2001
    Northern Wisconsin, but not far from civilization
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    upload_2025-6-12_18-32-0.jpeg

    Just started this today, about 1/3 of the way through.

    Katherine Stewart's new book is an in-depth(ish) look into the money behind the anti-democracy, Christian Nationalism movement.

    It is a bit all over the place, but I suspect it will begin to come together as it continues.
     
  10. Dr. Wankler

    Dr. Wankler Member+

    May 2, 2001
    The Electric City
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    About @ year ago, I read a couple of books, Key Thinkers of the Radical Right and War For Eternity, about Nationalist movements around the world. Basically, “finding a rich old guy” to be a patron is a dream for all the guys who want to be players in the movement.
     
  11. xtomx

    xtomx Member+

    Chicago Fire
    Sep 6, 2001
    Northern Wisconsin, but not far from civilization
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    It is my current obsession in reading. It started with Jane Mayer's Dark Money and went from there.

    The first couple of chapters is basically about "Well there a bunch of rich old guys (and women)" to fund this crap, including several I did not know.
    I want a rich guy on the left to do that.
     
  12. Ismitje

    Ismitje Super Moderator

    Dec 30, 2000
    The Palouse
    Club:
    Real Salt Lake
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Once upon a time, this was cutting edge: Hubris - The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War by David Corn and Michael Isikoff. It came out in 2006 so that it's old hat isn't its fault. I picked it up off one of the end-of-Spring-semester "take one they're free" piles that appear in many academic buildings. And good news for me: the pile is still there so I can return it now that I am done! Great cover photo too.

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  13. Dr. Wankler

    Dr. Wankler Member+

    May 2, 2001
    The Electric City
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    [​IMG]

    The Book of Revelation: A Biography, another book in the "Lives of Great Religous Books" series by Princeton University Press. I read the one about Genesis last month, which is pretty good. Then I tried Exodus, which was not. However, Timothy Beal has a pretty good entry in the series with Revelation. It helps that the book his, for obvious reasons, generated A LOT of looney-toon interpretations.
     
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  14. TheJoeGreene

    TheJoeGreene Member+

    Aug 19, 2012
    The Lubbock Texas
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    Germany
    [​IMG]

    Deluxe: How Luxury Lost Its Luster - Dana Thomas

    Published in 2007, this is a look at the history of most of the major brands and products of the luxury industry, where it had gone with mass marketing and cheaper products in the 80s and 90s, the emerging markets of India, China, and Russia, and the rise of the truly couture experience again in the early 00s. It's 346 pages, but rarely dull. She's got a newer book continuing on the topic, but I doubt I'll get to it anytime soon.
     
  15. Dr. Wankler

    Dr. Wankler Member+

    May 2, 2001
    The Electric City
    Club:
    Chicago Fire
    I read the section on exercise. Not bad at all. Glad to see none of the strength and conditioning guys I follow on YouTube exhibit any cult like tendencies in their advocacy for their approaches.


    Concur. I don’t see what is wrong with Journalist or Free Lance Writer. Besides, a fair amount of her analysis is closer to rhetoric than to linguistics.

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    A memoir by Dana Gioa, a poet whos3 poetry I don’t like, but who is an excellent and entertaining critic, essayist and memoirist.
     
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