I’ve been out of the habit of reading for the better part of a decade now, I usually read like 1-2 books a year.
I’m looking to ramp it up. What I’ve enjoyed lately was parable of the sower/talents and dawn + the sequels by Octavia Butler.
Additionally I’m like super theory illiterate and history as well.
Looking for:
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Theory/commentary (including newer stuff)
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sci fi
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history
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collapse/eco/survival stuff
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mutual aid & organizing
Any recs? Or links to lists of recs? Also open to things outside of what I listed
Again recommending Peter Watts. His Rifters trilogy is good as are Blindsight and Echopraxia. Bleak stuff but crammed with interesting ideas. And all available for free on his website as a fuck you to a publisher that screwed him over
Fanon’s Wretched of the Earth, Lenin’s Works vol 22, Reed’s Ten Days That Shook the World, The essential Epicurus letters, Gramsci’s Prison Notebooks, Hudson’s Super Imperialism, Mao’s On Contradiction, and On correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People, Foster’s Marx’s Ecology.
Only if you have a ton of time and end up really liking what you read, its usually in 3 volumes, at least for the English translations. Get the Selections version that you usually see when you type that phrase in to find it whether it be your-favorite-bookstore.com or Anna’s Archive it should be the first result. All those books should be easy to find there. :party-parrot-science:
Austerity Ecology and the Collapse Porn Addicts is one of my favs. An exceptional book on ecology, very pro-humanist and actually makes me feel a bit better about the future. The author Leigh Phillips is very well read and it’s meticulously researched.
He and another guy also wrote a book on economic planning called The People’s Republic of Wal-Mart which is also great (minus the one chapter which slags off Stalin, depending on your views on the subject of course, nevertheless worth reading for sure)
comedy/sci-fi:
Sirens of Titan by Kurt Vonnegut
Antkind by Charlie Kaufman
John Dies at the End by David Wong
Theory: As We Have Always Done
Indigenous anti capitalist feminism drawing heavily on Fanon. Good overview of what we’re up against and some ways forward.
Scifi: the fifth season
Geomancer slaves end white supremacy with notes from butler and le guine
Organizing: Labor Notes’ Secrets of a Successful Organizer
Step by step guide to organizing your workplace