I spent a great deal of my time this year re-reading my favorite comic books (by Joann Sfar, Lewis Trondheim, Christophe Blain), and watching a lot of television series (possibly too many).
That is why my focus on reading was more directed towards non-fiction, mostly about the situation of our human species, in the universe, in our history, our interactions, our society.
Two books really stood out for me: Joseph Henrich's "The WEIRDest People In The World", about what historical aspects - including the church's prohibition to marry first cousins - created a drive toward innovation and democracy in Western Europe in the past 700 years. The second is Francesca Stavrakopoulou's "God, An Anatomy", in which she details all the body parts of god based on biblical and other ancient texts, helping us interpret some of the strange sayings in the bible, and to understand its origins from other and earlier religions. Both books show an incredible knowledge of the subject matter, inventive insights and craftfully written.
I also enjoyed "Metazoa", a book that explores the level of consciousness among living things, from the simplest to the most complex.
Non-fiction- Joseph Henrich - The WEIRDest People In The World (Allan Lane, 2020) *****
- Francesca Stavrakopoulou - God - An Anatomy (Picador, 2021) *****
- Peter Godfrey-Smith - Metazoa - Animal Minds And The Birth Of Consciousness (William Collins, 2020) ****½
- Francis Fukuyama - Identity - Contemporary Identity Politics and the Struggle for Recognition (Profile Books, 2019) ****
- Michio Kaku - The God Equation - The Quest For A Theory Of Everything (Allen Lane, 2021) ****
- Rebecca Wragg Sykes - Kindred - Neanderthal Live, Love, Death And Art (Bloomsbury, 2020) ****
- Martin Amis - Inside Story (Jonathan Cape, 2020) ****
- Carlo Rovelli - Helgoland (Allan Lane, 2021) ****
- Anil Seth - Being You - A New Science Of Consciousness (Faber & Faber, 2021) ****
- Sarah Rose Cavanagh - Hivemind - The New Science Of Tribalism in our Divided World (Orion Spring, 2019) ***
- Heidi J. Larson - Stuck "How Vaccine Rumors Start - And Why They Don't Go Away"(Oxford University Press, 2020) ***½
- Ronald F. Inglehart - Cultural Evolution (Cambridge University Press, 2018) ***½
- Brian Clegg - Dark Matter & Dark Energy (Icon Books, 2019) ***
- Salman Rushdie - Quichotte (Penguin, 2019) ****
- Mario Vargas Llosa - Harsh Times (Faber, 2021) ***½
- Fiona Mozley - Elmet (John Murray, 2018) ***½
- Kent Haruf - Plainsong (Picador, 1999) ***
- Tim Winton - That Eye The Sky (Penguin, 1986) ***
- Yasser Abdel Hafez - The Book Of Safety (Hoopoe, 2013) **½
- Julian Barnes - The Only Story (Penguin, 2018) **
- Ocean Vuong - On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous (Penguin, 2019) **
- Denis Johnson - The Largesse Of The Sea Maiden (Vintage, 2018) *
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