The Bygones Collective

Books I read in 2025

I did a marginally better job tracking my reading order this year, though it's still not great, so outside of obvious chronological entries, the order is a little slapdash.

  1. "Atomic Habits," by James Clear - audiobook, narrated by the author - What's a reading list without an early January self-help book? I appreciated Clear's ideas though I'm not sure how much of it really resonated with me.
  2. "Letters from a Stoic," by Seneca - I'm glad I read this after I read "On the Shortness of Life" (see last year's list). IMO, it felt considerably more preachy, especially the later entries which really started to err towards "old man yelling at clouds" territory. Still some great ideas even if it overstayed its welcome.
  3. "Don Quixote," by Cervantes, trans. Edith Grossman - audiobook, narrated by George Guidall - Really pleasantly surprised at how humorous this one was and how well it's held up over 600 years later. I also thought both the translation and narration were excellently done. That said, it is a long listen, like 2/3 of the entire LotR series long.
  4. "Four Thousand Weeks: Time Management for Mortals," by Oliver Burkeman - audiobook, narrated by the author - This resonated a lot more with me than Atomic Habits did, for whatever that's worth. I've been following the tenets of Stoicism for ~6 years now, and while Burkeman doesn't exactly preach the philosophy directly, a lot of his ideas in this book align with the general mindset quite well, which made for a comfortable if somewhat predictable listen.
  5. "Jim Harrison: The Essential Poems" - Stumbled across this one by chance at a local bookstore, and I'm so glad I did. I've always preferred free verse poetry, and Harrison is now easily one of my favorite examples of American free verse that I've ever had the privilege of reading.
  6. "God Is Not Great," by Christopher Hitchens - audiobook, narrated by the author - Hitchens is one of the few "New Atheism" authors that gained notoriety in the early 2000s that I can still (kind of) stomach at this point in time. While I certainly don't align with 100% of what Hitchens outlines in this book, I think it's a well-crafted read, if somewhat redundant of me to read at this point in my life. Do note that, while I think Christopher Hitchens is a very eloquent speaker, his narration of this book is not great. He mumbles a good deal. I always appreciate literature narrated by the author itself so no nuance is lost, and I do enjoy Hitchens's narrative style, but it's just logistically hard to listen to if you're in a noisy space.
  7. "Accidental Agile Project Manager," by Ray Frohnhoefer - I picked this one up when I realized that I could use a little upskilling in this department due to some projects that were heading my way at work. It's a very quick and easy read, and I'd recommend it to anyone who finds themselves in a similar boat.
  8. "The Wheel of Time, Book 3: The Dragon Reborn," by Robert Jordan - Continuing my glacial progression through this series, book 3 was another solid entry, culminating in a predictable but entertaining climax that clearly helps set up the course of the next few entries.
  9. "The Wheel of Time, Book 4: The Shadow Rising," by Robert Jordan - I personally preferred book 4 over book 3. Neither was weak by any means, but book 4 brought about some very interesting plot points (read: Rhuidean) that start to paint a much larger and more interesting narrative across the universe that Jordan has crafted here. We're already well into book 5 this year and I'm hoping to at least get through 6 and 7 before I write another of these.

I'll end this list by saying that I picked up considerably more books this year, but finished fewer, so I'm hoping I'll have a lot more to show for 2026 a year from now. There's a certain irony to the fact that having a child caused me to reconsider how I was spending my time, and helped reinvigorate my love for reading, and then a few short months later, having a 6-to-12-month-old child is nearly the sole reason why it became considerably harder to finish as many books. This might have been the first instance of give-and-take with the kiddo, but I'm sure it won't be the last :)

#personal