{"id":1038,"date":"2014-03-25T21:51:25","date_gmt":"2014-03-26T04:51:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/?p=1038"},"modified":"2014-03-25T21:51:25","modified_gmt":"2014-03-26T04:51:25","slug":"9-memorable-books","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/2014\/03\/25\/9-memorable-books\/","title":{"rendered":"9 memorable books"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gregory Fischer<\/a> (who came into my life through Micky’s dear friend Stephanie Grand Jacques) passed along one of these “chain letters” that makes the rounds on Facebook. I tend to ignore them, but I really liked the premise behind this one – List 9 books that touched me. I spent way too much time thinking about this, but so it goes. Here is my list. I won’t pass it on so as to prevent spreading the pain \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

1) Siddhartha by Herman Hesse – I read this in 4th grade. Hatice gave it to me, and to this day I remember it like I’m still reading it in real time. I don’t know whether it was the father\/son relationship, or the introduction to a foreign culture, but I can’t seem to let this one go<\/p>\n

2) The Redwall Series by Brian Jacques – We had a program in elementary school where you took quizzes on books, got points, and then went to parties. I had the 2nd highest total at school, and found these books because they were that sweet spot of high points, but not too long to read. LOVED them, and read each one through Brian Jacques passing a few years back.<\/p>\n

3) The Mythical Man Month by Fred Brooks – Read this during college, and started to realize that computer science was not engineering. This book still tickles me in the back of my head as I think about how to create systems that scale. It’s all about consistency & transparency, and not at all about more.<\/p>\n

4) The Pragrammatic Programmer by Dave Thomas and Andy Hunt – When I was an engineer, this book shaped how I built software. I was never a good engineer, but I was definitely efficient when I actually focused and thought through the deliverable. Hat tip to Eishay Smith<\/a> for this one<\/p>\n

5) Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein – First book I read to Amelia. We read it in the NICU together, and Tim Bacon<\/a> and I bonded about storytelling, getting out of the NICU, and getting back to normal. The poetry helped.<\/p>\n

6) The Book Thief by Markus Zusak – I read this on our honeymoon, and it brought me back to reading fiction, and not just news, business books, etc.. I’d given up reading after English class 12th grade because the process of over analyzing book after book ruined the hobby for me<\/p>\n

7) Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card – My favorite sci-fi book (or maybe I’d put Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson here).<\/p>\n

8) The Giver by Lois Lowry – My first dystopian novel. I still don’t know why they would ask us to read this in 4th grade. The themes, the mood, everything about it is too much for a 9 year old’s world view. And yet I loved it.<\/p>\n

That’s it. I couldn’t find #9<\/p>\n

Good challenge. Great trip down memory lane.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Gregory Fischer (who came into my life through Micky’s dear friend Stephanie Grand Jacques) passed along one of these “chain letters” that makes the rounds on Facebook. I tend to ignore them, but I really liked the premise behind this one – List 9 books that touched me. I spent way too much time thinking […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[4,1],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pQyAq-gK","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1092,"url":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/2014\/04\/07\/book-updates\/","url_meta":{"origin":1038,"position":0},"title":"Book updates","date":"April 7, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"A new month means another book update!! I finished both of my work related books. The Kanban book I found really useful. The design book less so. I then decided to go fiction, and found a suggestion from either the Kottke blog or from MG Sieglar's blog to read Ishmael\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "New Year Resolutions"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1464,"url":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/2015\/01\/01\/a-year-in-preview\/","url_meta":{"origin":1038,"position":1},"title":"A year in preview","date":"January 1, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"My 2015 New Year's resolutions for all to see, and to help hold me accountable. Lose 30 pounds I hopped on the scale after landing from the plane today at a very unhealthy 199\u00c2\u00a0pounds.\u00c2\u00a0In 364 days, I'll be a much healthier 169 pounds if I hit this goal. I'd love\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "New Year Resolutions"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":910,"url":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/2014\/02\/10\/books-of-the-month\/","url_meta":{"origin":1038,"position":2},"title":"Book(s) of the month","date":"February 10, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Having finished two books in January, I'm feeling pretty good about my quest to read one book per month this year. For February, I've chosen two books (and I think it's going to take me until March to finish). They are: Kanban: Successful Evolutionary Change for Your Technology Business and\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "New Year Resolutions"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":16,"url":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/2006\/07\/07\/books-id-like-to-read\/","url_meta":{"origin":1038,"position":3},"title":"Books I'd like to read","date":"July 7, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Vienna and Chicago: Friends or Foes? - By Mark Skousen","rel":"","context":"In "just thinking out loud"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1263,"url":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/2014\/10\/12\/catching-up-on-books\/","url_meta":{"origin":1038,"position":4},"title":"Catching up on books","date":"October 12, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"I've had a chance to really dive deep into the book New Year's resolution because of holiday and a bit of MUNI travel, and so I thought I'd update the world. 1) Hatching Twitter by Nick Bilton Holy smokes the author hates Jack Dorsey. And founding stories are so much\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "New Year Resolutions"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":735,"url":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/2014\/01\/03\/mass-consuming-my-media\/","url_meta":{"origin":1038,"position":5},"title":"Mass consuming my media","date":"January 3, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Micky started watching the CBS sitcom, \"The Good Wife\", and we're both hooked. I know the show has been on for a while, and that the reviews have been good, but we haven't gotten into it before. It got me thinking about how I consume TV these days. I really\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "just thinking out loud"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1038"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1038"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1038\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1038"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1038"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.onvural.net\/melih\/thoughts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1038"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}