A running list of the books I read over the course of 2020. A star indicates something I’d near-universally recommend. Where I published book notes those are linked.

  • The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson. ★
  • The Importance of Living by Lin Yutang.
  • The Once and Future King by T.H. White.
  • Delivering Happiness by Tony Hsieh. ★
  • Shape Up by Ryan Singer.
  • The Structure of Political Positions by Blake Pagenkopf.
  • The 1918 Shikoku Pilgrimage of Takamure Itsue by Susan Tennant.
  • Lady Susan, The Watsons, Sanditon by Jane Austen.
  • Vietnam: An Epic Tragedy by Max Hastings.
  • The Quiet American by Graham Greene.
  • Persuasion by Jane Austen.
  • The Greenlanders by Jane Smiley.
  • On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder.
  • A Complaint Is a Gift by Janelle Barlow and Claus Møller.
  • Capitalism, Alone by Branko Milanovic.
  • What Tech Calls Thinking by Adrian Daub.
  • Subprime Attention Crisis by Tim Hwang.
  • Kissa by Kissa by Craig Mod.
  • Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen.
  • Behind the Screen by Sarah T. Roberts.
  • Mansfield Park by Jane Austen.
  • Breaking Bread with the Dead by Alan Jacobs.
  • How to Stay Sane in an Age of Division by Elif Shafak.
  • Demand-Side Sales by Bob Moesta. ★
  • The High King by Lloyd Alexander.
  • Self Renewal by John Gardner.
  • Taran Wanderer by Lloyd Alexander.
  • The Toyota Way by Jeffrey Liker.
  • Writing Tools by Roy Peter Clark.
  • The Castle of Llyr by Lloyd Alexander.
  • The Black Cauldron by Lloyd Alexander.
  • The Undefeated Mind by Alex Lickerman.
  • The Book of Three by Lloyd Alexander.
  • Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll.
  • What is Reading For? by Robert Bringhurst.
  • Working in Public by Nadia Eghbal.
  • Sisters in Hate by Seyward Darby.
  • Scribes and Scholars by L.D. Reynolds and N.G. Wilson.
  • Silver on the Tree by Susan Cooper.
  • A Reader on Reading by Alberto Manguel.
  • The Grey King by Susan Cooper.
  • Greenwitch by Susan Cooper.
  • Privacy and Solitude in the Middle Ages by Diana Webb.
  • The Dark is Rising by Susan Cooper.
  • Over Sea, Under Stone by Susan Cooper.
  • Emma by Jane Austen.
  • How to Live on 24 Hours a Day by Arnold Bennett.
  • Powerful by Patty McCord.
  • The Gutenberg Elegies by Sven Birkerts.
  • A Place of My Own by Michael Pollan.
  • The Book in the Renaissance by Andrew Pettegree.
  • Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen.
  • The Rise of the Image, the Fall of the Word by Mitchell Stephens.
  • Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen.
  • A History of Reading by Alberto Manguel.
  • Black Swan Green by David Mitchell.
  • The Pleasures of Reading in an Age of Distraction by Alan Jacobs.
  • Deep Work by Cal Newport.
  • Smarter Faster Better by Charles Duhigg.
  • The Power of Habit by Charles Duhigg.
  • Atomic Habits by James Clear. ★
  • Letters from a Stoic by Seneca.
  • Dreamland by Sam Quinones.
  • Dignity by Chris Arnade. ★
  • 24/6 by Tiffany Shlain.
  • Destined for War by Graham Allison.
  • Peter Camenzind by Hermann Hesse.
  • Vaccinated by Paul A. Offit.
  • The Art of Stillness by Pico Iyer.
  • Upstream by Dan Heath.
  • Narcissus and Goldmund by Hermann Hesse.
  • The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami.
  • What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami.
  • Lost Horizon by James Hilton.
  • On The Good Lifeby Cicero.
  • The Journey to the East by Hermann Hesse.
  • Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse. ★
  • White Noise by Don DeLillo.
  • How to Be an Epicurean by Catherine Wilson.
  • Exhalation by Ted Chiang.
  • The Obstacle Is The Way by Ryan Holiday.
  • Naïve Super by Erlend Loe.
  • Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill.
  • Peak: The New Science of Expertise by Anders Ericsson and Robert Pool. ★
  • On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong.
  • The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro.
  • High Growth Handbook by Elad Gil.
  • Weather by Jenny Offill.
  • Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling.
  • How to Be Bored by Eva Hoffman.
  • Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince by J.K. Rowling.
  • How to Not Always Be Working by Marlee Grace.
  • Buyology by Martin Lindstrom.
  • The Dawn Watch by Maya Jasanoff.
  • Barcelona by Robert Hughes.
  • The Tortilla Curtain by T.C. Boyle.
  • The Great Mental Models by Farnam Street.
  • Draft No. 4 by John McPhee.
  • The Writing Life by Annie Dillard.
  • How to Write an Autobiographical Novel by Alexander Chee.
  • Indistractable by Nir Eyal.
  • The Bells of Old Tokyo by Anna Sherman.
  • Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling.

I’m Andrew, the Head of Customer Experience at Automattic, where we make great products for the web. I'm an avid reader, runner, and traveler.