2012 Book A Fortnight Summary & Happy New Year!

Happy New Year 2013. Remember my Book A Fortnight Challenge? Well not only did I complete it, I killed it! The goal was to read 26 books in the 52 weeks that were 2012 which ends up being a book a fortnight (a fortnight being 2 weeks). My final count for the year? 43 books read! That means that I read approximately 80% of a book each week (on average) throughout the course of the year! I have the full list of books read below but I didn’t include a 44th book I read – Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card – because I have read it a bunch of times before so wasn’t sure it should be included in the final tally.

I have organized the below in my own categories and subcategories. I have grouped together some books by series and kept books by the same author close to each other. As well, the links I have provided for the books – for anyone who wants to read them themselves – link mostly to the Toronto Public Library.

Without the Toronto Public Library this would have been an extremely expensive challenge and so I encourage anyone reading this who lives in Toronto to check them out (the library system as well as the books from the library). It is so simple to do that you don’t even have to go browse to find books anymore! Assuming you already have a library card/account just go to the link (or search the library site yourself), click “Place A Hold,” tell the system where you want the book to be held for you, and then just wait for them to email/call you (your choice) and go pick up the book(s) on a special hold shelf. Done! In and out of the actual, physical library in under 5 minutes!

I have also put books I highly recommend everyone check out in bold. Other books I have added my own $0.02 in on what I thought about them if I thought they were especially good or otherwise.

Thought Provoking/Intelligent/General

• Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell
• Unmarketing by Scott Stratten
• Purple Cow by Seth Godin
• Poke The Box by Seth Godin (Amazon Link)
  • Super short book but I highly recommend you read the crap out of it. It is all about being willing to take the initiative and push yourself and your creativity to new heights. I actually plan on reading this again and again and even got one for my buddy, Anton.
• The One-Week Job Project: 1 Man, 1 Year, 52 Jobs by Sean Aiken
  • Heard this guy talk at IdeaCity 2012 which I attended courtesy of the good folks at Research In Motion/BlackBerry. Because I also felt very much like he did at the beginning of his book – and still somewhat do – not quite finding my passion in life which I can do day-to-day and make good money doing it I was inclined to read this book and I do not regret it. I highly recommend you read this book. Also, I enjoyed the shoutout to my friends over at Steam Whistle who were mentioned numerous times in the book as they were one of the places that Sean Aiken worked for a week. As well, the owners of Steam Whistle  - being the awesome people they are – let Sean stay at one of their places while he was in Toronto working other jobs. 
• The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
• Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
• Alas, Babylon by Pat Frank 
  • The book that launched a genre of apocolyptic fiction at the dawn of the nuclear age. It was published 53 years ago and is still popular. Great, great read! 
• Gold Digger Nation: Why You Should Remain Single by Hal Roback (Amazon link)
• But He Was Good to His Mother: The Lives and Crimes of Jewish Gangsters by Robert A. Rockaway (1993 Edition) (Amazon Link)
• Unnatural selection : choosing boys over girls, and the consequences of a world full of men by Mara Hvistendahl
  • Heard this lady speak at IdeaCity 2012 which I attended courtesy of the good folks at Research In Motion/BlackBerry. Her talk was so interesting I immediately went out and ordered the book from the library just so I can read further into the subject. It is, to be honest, pretty scary stuff but super interesting! If you can go to Ideacity 2013 I highly recommend you make plans to go – and I haven’t even looked at the speaker lineup.
• The Devil In The White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America by Erik Larson
  • A friend recommended I read this book and I really didn’t enjoy reading it and wouldn’t recommend anyone else read it. The book had many threads which didn’t really tie together in anything but the most general of ways and it felt like it could have been 2 or 3 different books. I honestly found it painful to read and had to really push myself to read it.
• Thank You For Smoking by Christopher Buckley
  • The book on which one of my favorite movies of the same name is based. Maybe because I had seen the movie beforehand, I prefer the ending of the movie to the book but both were great.
• Supreme Courtship by Christopher Buckley
• Clifton Chronicles
  • Only Time Will Tell: Clifton Chronicles Book 1 by Jeffrey Archer
  • The Sins of the Father: Clifton Chronicles Book 2 by Jeffrey Archer
• Assassin Trilogy (Note: I had previously read the first book “Prayers for the Assassin’ before beginnign the challenge)
  • Sins of the Assassin by Robert Ferrigno
  • Heart of the Assassin by Robert Ferrigno

Humor

• I Just Want My Pants Back by David Rosen
• How to Archer: The Ultimate Guide to Espionage and Style and Women and Also Cocktails Ever Written by Sterling Archer
• The Gospel Of The The Flying Spaghetti Monster by Bobby Henderson
• Hilarity Ensues by Tucker Max
• How I Met Your Mother “Tie In Books”
  • The Bro Code for Parents: What to Expect When You’re Awesome by Matt Kuhn (& Barney Stinson)
  • The Playbook: Suit Up, Score Chicks, Be Awesome by Matt Kuhn (& Barney Stinson)

Sci-Fi

• Redshirts by John Scalzi
• Triggers by Robert J. Sawyer
• Julian Comstock : a story of 22nd-century America by Robert Charles Wilson
• The Unincorporated World
  • The Unincorporated Man by Dani Kollin and Eytan Kollin
  • The Unincorporated War  by Dani Kollin and Eytan Kollin
  • The Unincorporated Woman  by Dani Kollin and Eytan Kollin
  • The Unincorporated Future  by Dani Kollin and Eytan Kollin
• Ender’s Game/Enderverse Books
  • Shadows In Flight by Orson Scott Card
  • Earth Unaware by Orson Scott Card
  • (Not sure if it should be counted but I read the first book in this series of books, Ender’s Game. If you haven’t read it, go out and do so immediately. It is awesomesauce. It is one of my favorite books of all time.)
• TimeRiders Series
  • TimeRiders: Day of the Predator by Alex Scarrow
  • TimeRiders by Alex Scarrow
  • TimeRiders: The Doomsday Code by Alex Scarrow
  • Timeriders: The Eternal War by Alex Scarrow
• The War That Came Early - What if Chamberlain hadn’t signed an agreement with Hitler in 1938 and WWII began earlier than in our own history?
  • The War That Came Early: West and East by Harry Turtledove
  • The War That Came Early: The Big Switch by Harry Turtledove
  • The War That Came Early: Coup D’Etat by Harry Turtledove
• Atlantis - What if there were an eighth continent, separate from North America, dubbed Atlantis and discovered earlier than the voyage of Columbus because it was closer to Europe?
  • Opening Atlantis by Harry Turtledove
  • United States of Atlantis by Harry Turtledove
  • Liberating Atlantis by Harry Turtledove