Following my post about books I have read in 2024 I’ve gotten few questions asking to share my reading list, books which I am planning to read in the near future. The reality is that I don’t really have a well-defined reading list. Both me and my wife are suffering from severe case of tsundoku, so we have pile of books on our shelves waiting to be read. tsundoku (積ん読) is a practice of buying books without actually reading them.

Nevertheless, I certainly have some books I am hoping to read in 2025 divided into several loosely defined categories.

Want to recommend me a book? Drop me a mail [email protected] or DM me on Mastodon, X or Bluesky

Science of Life

I have read Genome: The Autobiography of a Species in 23 Chapters few years ago and have been on look out for similar books ever since. My back log currently contains:

• The Vital Question: Energy, Evolution, and the Origins of Complex Life
• The Gene: An Intimate History
• The Song of the Cell: An Exploration of Medicine and the New Human
• I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life
• How Life Works: A User’s Guide to the New Biology - most recent addition based of Bryan Cantrill’s recommendation.

I have tried to read The Vital Question before but at some point it became too dense for my state of mind then and I gave up. I am looking to trying again, maybe in a different order (e.g. read How Life Works first).

Classics of fiction

Dostoevsky

I hope to finish The Brothers Karamazov (Братья Карамазовы) this year. Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment (Преступление и наказание) is part of the highschool literature curriculum - but I must admit I was really put off by Dostoevsky’s writing when I was a teenager. There was something unpleasant in the way he was building sentences and stringing words together that made it hard for me to concentrate on his words. Now, as I look back, and pick up his writing again it hits me very differently. I don’t seem to have any problem with his writing anymore - and I can now actually appreciate what he writes about. The characters he paints, their thoughts and actions are something I can finally relate to from the height of my personal experience. Maybe it is just stupid to ask high-schoolers to read and appreciate Dostoevsky when they have not lived enough yet.

My father is a huge fan of Dostoevsky’s writings - he has read most of his works so many times that the books are literally falling apart. When I was younger that was one of disagreements between us - whether or not Dostoevsky’s is worth reading. I don’t think I will ever see his writing in the same way my father sees it - but my perception is definitely shifted away from “Meh, this is just boooring”.

Genji Monogatari

The Tale of Genji is a classic work of Japanese literature dating to 12th century. The first time I heard about it was when I was in my early teens… Back then I used to read or better said swallow books by Brothers Strugatsky (Братья Стругацкие) and their last hard science fiction novel Space Apprentice (Стажёры) mentions Genji Monogotari: Never heard about Strugatsky? Check them out then. My personal favorite is The Doomed City (Град обречённый). Other notable works include: The Ugly Swans (Гадкие лебеди), Roadside Picnic (Пикник на обочине), Hard to Be a God (Трудно быть богом), Beetle in the Anthill (Жук в муравейнике). Finally there is hilarious Monday Starts on Saturday (Понедельник начинается в Субботу) - which I think can hold its own against the humour of Terry Pratchett and Douglas Adams.

“Really, pal, the swamp isn’t the point,” Zhilin said, then leaned back in his chair and moved into his favorite pose: head back, hands clasped behind it, elbows spread. “And please don’t think that I’m hinting about the difference in our ages. No. It’s not true, you know, that there are children and adults. It’s all much more complicated. There are adults and there are adults. Take, for instance, you, me, and Mikhail Antonovich. Would you now in your right mind start reading The Tale of Genji? I see the answer on your face. But Mikhail Antonovich is rereading Genji for the fifth time, I think, and I appreciated his charm only this year.” Zhilin paused. “The charm of the character, of course. I appreciated the charm of Mikhail Antonovich much earlier.”

Yura looked at him doubtfully.

“I know it’s a classic and all that,” he said. “But I wouldn’t read Genji five times. It’s all complicated and confused… and life is actually simple, much more simple than they depict in those books.”

“No, life is complicated,” Zhilin said.

That’s how I heard of and became interested in The Tale of Genji. Last year (probably more than 20-25 years since I have heard about it for the first time) I have finally acquired a beautiful illustrated translation with a commentary and I am hoping to read it this year.

Stories of people, companies and projects

I have just finished 747: Creating the World’s First Jumbo Jet and Other Adventures from a Life in Aviation by Joe Sutter, the “father of the 747” himself. Sutter joined Boeing at the age of 25 (in 1946) and worked there as am employee for 40 years until mandatory retirement at 65. He led 747 design as a chief engineer and it was certainly interesting to read his account of the events.

I am currently reading Showstopper! the Breakneck Race to Create Windows NT and the Next Generation at Microsoft. I had started on this book some time ago but then put it away for some reason. Going to finish it now.

Three more books I am hoping to read in this category are:

• Who Says Elephants Can’t Dance? Inside IBM’s Historic Turnaround another book I have started some time ago but did not finish. Planning to return to it, but read it through the prism of The Man Who Broke Capitalism and Understanding Michael Porter, I’ve read last year.
• Becoming Trader Joe: How I Did Business My Way and Still Beat the Big Guys.
• The Bond King: How One Man Made a Market, Built an Empire, and Lost it All

Software Engineering

I would like to read Modern Software Engineering: Doing What Works to Build Better Software Faster and see a) if it is any good and b) if I could myself learn something interesting. If it is any good I would start recommending it to junior engineers on the team, similar to how I do it with A Philosophy of Software Design.

I also picked up a copy of The Art of Writing Efficient Programs: An advanced programmer’s guide to efficient hardware utilization and compiler optimizations using C++ examples for similar reasons. It has been highly recommended by people I respect and it does seem like a good introduction to the topic. I've read a few pages and unfortunately stumbled into minor inaccuracy already. The book claims that "Google CPU Profiler also uses hardware performance counters" which is not correct. Hmm.

Game Development History

I am looking forward to reading Building SimCity: How to Put the World in a Machine. I was not a big SimCity player back in the day, but I am certainly more interested in learning how SimCity works under the cover than in playing it.

Miscellaneous

My wife recommended me How to Know a Person: The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen, which she in turn picked up based on Bill Gates’ recommendation.

I also want to read Thinking In Systems: A Primer which I picked up last year based on someone’s recommendation on Twitter.

Want to discuss contents of this post? Drop me a mail [email protected] or find me on Mastodon, X or Bluesky.