Best reads of 2024
These were the best things that I read in 2024 in no particular order:
Boom: Boom is a must read for anyone interested in the history and future of technology. Check out my review of it just below for a summary of its arguments and what I think its limits are.
Three Body Problem Series: I’ve been aware of this work and its broad strokes for years, but somehow avoided actually reading it until now this year. I enjoyed it so much that it rekindled my interest in sci-fi, although not much else has matched its grandeur, scale, or the thoughts that it has provoked.
The End of History: I was surprised how much more nuanced this much derided tome by Fukuyama was than its popular image would have you believe. It was a good, hopeful read full of truth even today. I also wrote a review/summary here.
On China: Kissinger’s 2011 work did a great job relaying the history of China, its unique civilization, and corresponding world view. I read many other books on China this year, and this was the one that I came away feeling like I had learned the most about China.
In general this year I read broadly, but in targeted clusters. The winter was focused on political philosophy, the spring sci-fi, the summer China, the fall the Middle-East. I’m very interested in the past and future of liberalism, and the idea of civilizational states recently popularized by Bruno Maçães which guides my reading about history and other civilizations.
Other books I enjoyed but which didn’t make the top list: Sun and Steel, Conflict, Focus: the ASML way, Natural Right And History (pairs great with the End of History), Israel: A Concise History of a Nation Reborn, and Iran: Nation of the Mind.
In case you’re interested, here are my 2023, 2022, and 2020 reading lists, which were published mostly silently. I’m always interested in recommendations if anyone has any!
Great picks.