These are my favorite books read in 2024, in no particular order.
Born a Crime
I had heard that the audiobook version is excellent. One year after reading the book, I listened to it. Trevor did a great job at reading it, doing the voices of the people in his life, and using humor while talking through some of his hardships and his relationship with his mom (the story’s hero).
As an extra motivator, I had been reading Long Walk to Freedom – The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela. Trevor was a child when Mandela helped end apartheid in South Africa, so it’s been interesting to learn a little about that part of history through two different perspectives.
Four Thousand Weeks
I loved the book! It had been on my list for a while. It’s not the typical book on time management.
“Boy, I sure admire you. I’ve never been able to fix those kinds of things!”
“That’s because you don’t take the time.”
If you’re willing to endure the discomfort of not knowing, a solution will often present itself.
Its All in the Lyrics
In May, I gave a talk to Improvers titled “Living Life Through Music.” Only a few months later, this book appeared as a suggestion on Amazon. Its description made me pick it up and read it immediately. The author’s motivations for creating such content overlap. I enjoyed this book and have been communicating with the author to discuss the topic.
It’s rare for me to write an Amazon review for a book. For this one, I had to. Full review here if you’re interested.
Kathini
A friend wrote this book. I met some of the characters and visited the primary location, and I loved it. I’ve been reading many memoirs and autobiographies, and this one is an excellent example of how to tell a memorable slice of a person’s life.
The Adventures of Johnny Bunko
I enjoyed Daniel H. Pink’s books, such as Drive and To Sell Is Human. I heard of The Adventures of Johnny Bunko when reading See What I Mean, which mentioned the book as an excellent example of using comics to explain important topics.
Favorite passage:
The most successful people improve their own lives by improving others’ lives. They help their customer solve their problems. They give their client something it didn’t know it was missing. That’s where they focus their energy, talent and brainpower.
Outward, not inward.
The most valuable people at any job bring out the best in others. They make their boss look good. They help their teammates succeed.
So pull your head out of your… ego.
The Creative Act
Rick Rubin is a record producer who has produced albums by some of my favorite bands, such as Slayer, Metallica, and Black Sabbath. He has also worked with various artists, from Adele and Johnny Cash to System of a Down and Slipknot.
I’ve watched many interviews with him, and hearing him talk about this book on creativity made me curious.
I enjoyed the book and am slowly reviewing my notes and highlights to ponder more. This is one of my favorite passages:
The reason we create art isn’t with the intention of making something useful for someone else. We create to express who we are. Who we are and where we are on our journey.
The Back of the Napkin
This was one of the most influential books for me this year!
The real goal of visual thinking is to make the complex understandable by making it visible – not by making it simple.
I applied its lessons several times and immediately experienced the benefit of drawing to clarify my ideas and present them to others. Although I had done this before, the book provided techniques that improved my practice.
It also inspired me to explore visual thinking further, so I read three other books on the subject.
I talk a little more about it in this video…
The Happiness of Pursuit
One of the things I love about Improving is that we have many book readers, so I’m never short of great book recommendations. This book is one of them.
The author discusses his quest to visit all the countries in the world. Most importantly, he discusses the experiences of many other people he met who were pursuing their quests.
Your identity isn’t tied to a job; your identity is who you really are.
That passage reminded me of when I pondered the same topic: does your work define you?
With all this travel, where did I fit in? Where was home?
Where I truly felt at home, I learned as I went along, was on the road itself.
That one reminded me of my song Home, which I wrote years ago when I asked myself the same question.
The Time Paradox
In an interview a while ago, I heard that different people and cultures are biased toward a given time perspective: past, present, or future. As I listened to this, I thought of how I perceive time now and how that has changed over the years. After reading Four Thousand Weeks (the average number of weeks we all get to live), I immediately started reading this book because I wanted to explore this topic more.
This was another influential book for me this year. I keep going back to my notes and exploring my time perspectives.
I’ve been mapping out my journey, and this book gave me more tools to explore past, present, and future. I’ll likely have posts and videos soon to share some of my thoughts and learnings.
In 2004, I started writing a song to express a nagging thought: “Hindsight is NOT always 20/20.” That thought came back to me in 2024. I finished the song and will release it soon.
UZMO – Thinking With Your Pen
I had heard a few Improvers read this book and enjoyed it. After reading two other books on visual communication, I should read this one next. I’m glad I did. I’ve been putting the techniques into practice, drawing scenarios for user stories and other things I need to communicate with my team and stakeholders, and the results are great.
Understanding Comics
I loved it! It’s a comic book that explains comic books, which is right up my alley. I have comic books to thank for turning me into an avid reader as a kid.
The author goes back in history: Egyptians used drawings to document or convey ideas. This book complements all the others I’ve recently read on using drawings to communicate.
The wall of ignorance that prevents so many human beings from seeing each other clearly can only be breached by communication.
User Story Mapping
I don’t remember when or how I learned about user story mapping, but I know I’ve used it over the years, such as when I wrote stories on sticky notes and put them up in my garage when I was planning what became the Beyond the Track (which is more than just a website). I often use story mapping to create new talks as well.
I picked up this book to revisit the fundamentals of story mapping and improve how I use it in my current project.
The book is excellent. Surprisingly, it also uses drawings inspired by the Back of the Napkin book mentioned earlier. The book’s content inspired me to create a workshop for Improvers to learn and practice story-mapping skills.
Useful Not True
I might have said this before, but Derek Sivers is one of my favorite authors. I’ve listened to several interviews where he mentioned what was happening in this new book, and I couldn’t wait to read it.
As with his previous books, I catch myself putting the book down after every other paragraph to ponder what I’ve just read. Also, as with his previous books, I’ve read it multiple times.
You override your instincts with wisdom.
We think of the past like it’s a physical fact – like it’s real. But we never have all the information – only interpretation. One story based on one point of view: that’s what we call “the past”.
Next time you look back, look again. Replay your past from different angles until you find the lesson or closure you need.
Implementing Lean Software Development
I read this book many years ago (maybe in 2007) and enjoyed it a lot. I finally reread it, and enjoyed it a lot just the same. I think anybody working on software projects should read it.
Visualizing the Books
In preparation for this blog post, I mapped my book learning path with Obsidian. I created a canvas to visualize the books I read and understand how I’m grouping and connecting them in my brain, review my notes, add notes to actions I might want to take with lessons I learned from those books, and consider books I might read next.
For 2025
And the reading goes on!
I’ll be creating a series of videos related to my book-reading practice, including one with tips on how to streamline the initial creation of a canvas with several books like the one above.
You might be interested in checking out the videos I’ve published so far:
Happy Reading!
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