Tag: books

The Two Prosecutors Novella

At first, I thought it would be difficult to find books by Georgiy Demidov, but it turned out that most of his works were published a while ago, have audio editions, and are available for free courtesy of the now-dissolved Memorial society. I could not find the Two Prosecutors right away because this work was included in a larger collection of stories, so I downloaded several of his books and started listening. Immediately, I realized that I had already read some of Demidov’s stories; it’s just that his name didn’t stick. Moreover, I remembered that I was not very impressed, and, looking at what I learned about him and his fundamental disagreement with Varlam Shalamov, I realized that I was in agreement with the latter and didn’t like the same aspects of Demidov’s works.

Still, I wanted to find and read Two Prosecutors, since the movie was so powerful and left such an impact on me. When I finally found it and listened, I was shocked and disappointed. The film was so much better! More precise, more expressive, more powerful.

Now I am wondering how Sergey Loznitsa managed to see such potential in this story, and now I admire his work even more!

Swiftynomics by Misty Heggeness

As it sometimes happens, I learned about this book because the Chicago Public Library announced a meeting with the author. I knew I wouldn’t be able to come because it was the day we did the egg coloring at ODS, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to join on Zoom, but I also knew that the livestream would be saved on the Library YouTube channel, so I bookmarked it. I tried to put a hold on the audiobook in the library, but there were over 100 people ahead of me, so I purchased the book and started listening, and actually finished it before March 31!

If you just watch the video, you might get the impression that Misty is mostly focused on Taylor Swift, but there is way more to it in the book! She speaks about all the well-known things which other authors mention (and which I cited from other books), like the “opportunity cost,” and how women with small children still choose to work even if the cost of the daycare consumes all of their earnings, because otherwise they would decrease their future earnings and chances of future promotion. She says that although “ordinary” women can’t afford what Taylor Swift can in terms of childcare, traveling with children, etc., she demonstrates what things should be, and what every woman should expect from society.

Also, I like how the book is structured, how it puts things into perspective, connects the dots, and also, how actionable it is.

I am not saying its a must-read, but if you pick it up, I hope you enjoy it!

Super-interesting Article About Biking In Chicago in the 1890s

Read how Chicago became the manufacturing hub of the nation’s bicycle industry — a city that produced a quarter of all U.S. bikes and claimed more than 200,000 riders at the height of the boom. It was also a place where women defied social expectations on two wheels, and where cycling clubs organized one of the country’s first powerful transportation lobbies.

Full article here.

About “Change Anything” Book

I read this book right after I read the “Stolen Focus. ” I would never pick it up on my own because I believe I am capable of making any changes in my life I want, but it was highly recommended by one of my peers, and after reading other people praising this book on his blog, I thought that it might be useful to read as something I could recommend to others. In fact, I know that my abilities of “change anything” is completely non-transferable, and I was hoping to find some working strategies.

On the surface, this book should work, though I didn’t start recommending it. The book starts with describing the “willpower trap.” Citing the famous marshmallow study, the authors say:

Unfortunately, to this day most people draw the wrong conclusion from this study. They fall into what might best be called “the willpower trap.” They assume that the only reason (among many possible reasons) certain kids were better at delaying gratification than others was that nature had endowed them with more willpower.

Patterson, Kerry; Grenny, Joseph; Maxfield, David; McMillan, Ron; Switzler, Al. Change Anything: The New Science of Personal Success (p. 15). (Function). Kindle Edition.

However, their research lab proved that, in reality, these kids had skills, and when they taught other kids these skills, the level of success was significantly higher. Changing your personal behavior and learning specific skills are important, but only a small part. Equally, if not more important, are the changes to your social circle (hanging out with a different crowd) and changes to your physical environment.

I think I will soon have a chance to speak with a person who succeeded using these strategies, and I am very interested in hearing a real-life story.

The authors then detail six sources of influence which are standing on the way of people trying to make changes in their lives, such as breaking away from bad habits. These sources of influence are:

  • personal motivation
  • personal ability.
  • social motivation
  • social ability
  • structural motivation
  • structural ability

Each of them can work against you or with you, helping you achieve your goals. In the rest of the book, the authors detail the changes a person can make in each of these six directions and the specific skills that can be developed. Not only do they describe some success stories, but they also lay out the paths each person had to take and the specific changes people adopted in each case to reach their goals.

Stolen Focus: A Short Review

I really liked the first half of Stolen Focus. I liked how the author described his initial frustration with his nephew’s inability to focus on real life and his own declining ability to focus, and how he originally attributed this to a lack of willpower (like most of us do). Then, he shifts from the idea that restoring focus depends on individuals to the understanding that there are certain societal forces and techniques used by social media and other online platforms that reward this behavior. After meeting and talking to people who claimed they could successfully break from these dependencies, he seems to be back to his original thought, and I like how he shows his thought process, going back and forth.

What I liked most was the concept of “cruel optimism”, which can be described as “you can overcome negative influence if you deploy certain techniques, and anyone can do this if they try.” I am guilty of doing a similar thing for many years, telling people that “if I could do it, they could do it as well.” It took me many years to learn to stop giving advice and explaining to people what and how they should do. I still fall into this behavior from time to time, but at least I recognize it and try to stop 🙂

The second half was less interesting because it mostly repeated well-known facts about the environment and general recommendations on how to minimize its impact, as well as rather generic self-help recommendations, so in the end, I was more disappointed than excited about this book, but I will definitely use the “cruel optimism” concept in my future discussions.

Rewiring Democracy: An Event With Bruce Schneier At CPL

First, I saw this event advertised in the CPL newsletter. Usually, a direct anything mentioning AI, straight into trash, but this time I hesitated, because I saw that the author was a cybersecurity expert, and the picture seemed very trustworthy :). I put the event in my calendar and purchased the audiobook.

I loved the book from the start! I see it having a relatively low rating on Goodreads, but I can tell you why it stood out for me. It started with the thesis that “democracy is an information system,” which immediately grabbed my attention. I soon realized that I was aware of AI use in political campaigns and lawmaking, because this was nothing but an extension of modelling that was widely present in politics even twenty years ago, and I didn’t object to it at all. I don’t know how else to explain it, but all of a sudden, it all started making sense. I think that a big factor was Bruce Schneier’s positive outlook and his firm belief that we can be in control and put the newest technology to good use.

The meeting was livestreamed and recorded, and you can check it out below. I would rather have you listen to it than me trying to “retell” what was said. I loved the reasoning about the short chain between consulting AI on how to vote and total autocracy.

My favorite part of the book, which was not mentioned in the talk, was about regulating AI by spot-checking its decisions. Also, it’s very important to remember that any technology can be used for different purposes, and AI is not an exception.

A book About Russia’s Serfdom

Just finished this book (“The Serfdom in Russia”). I rarely blog anything about the books I read in Russian, but I wanted to share my thoughts about this particular one.

In the preface, the author states that “we” do not know much about this period of Russian history and that even progressive historians and political figures have always been non-specific about how and what exactly was going on during this period.

I thought that this statement didn’t apply to me, but I was wrong. I still hadn’t thought through many details, even when I knew them.

The book goes in-depth in describing the unthinkable treatment of serves, even by the “good masters,” but one tiny mention struck me the most. That’s when the author recalls the episode from War and Peace, when Natasha Rostova is ready to go to bed and calls her maid to blow out the candle by her bed instead of blowing it out herself. Perhaps the most striking thing was that I never noticed anything wrong about it before.

2025. Part 2

Civic activities

Here, there are more negative than positive results. My biggest regret of 2025 is that I didn’t do enough during the election campaign. To be precise, I did zero canvassing and a very moderate amount of convincing people of what the right thing to do is. I knew it was wrong, but I kept telling myself that organizing Prairie Postgres is more important at that moment, and that I can’t do everything, and… I didn’t speak up enough, which I also regret. I post very little, if anything, political on LinkedIn, where I am most visible, and the list continues. I will never do it again!

I’ve done a little bit better at supporting DEI, regardless of the political climate, but I wasn’t consistent enough, so one of my goals for this year is to always keep this support on my radar.

Even with simple things like attending the rallies, I did way less than I did in previous years. Once again, my excuse was that I was twice as busy as before because of Prairie Postgres and my activities in the professional community. Still, I should always remember that if the country’s civic values are at risk, the interests of my professional community are at risk as well. I want to make an intentional effort to attend rallies when I really care about the cause. I know that society’s well-being depends on each individual’s actions, so I have no excuse. I know that each person matters. Earlier in 2025, I tried to become more involved in local initiatives, but I had to drop these activities because they looked like a very insignificant outcome for the time spent. I will try to get involved again in a couple of years, when I retire.

Cultural activities and reading

According to Goodreads, I read fewer books in 2025 than in 2024, but I believe that’s because I didn’t record books that ended up being a waste of time, and there were more of those in 2025. The majority of books were audiobooks, and that’s something I want to address. I switched to audiobooks because it is easier to listen while I am doing something else, and also because of my vision problems. Now that my vision is better, I am looking to find ways to read e-books again. Today, I realized I have a new option: I started taking the L more often, and when on the L, I can find a place to sit, but there isn’t enough space to open my computer, especially since I switched from Mac Air back to Mac Pro. This is the time when I can read e-books.

As for the other cultural activities, I attended many exhibits, concerts, operas, and different theatrical performances, but I didn’t keep track of them, and that’s something I want to do next year. I am still hungry for more cultural activities and want to see more performances than I have time to see, and oftentimes I feel disappointed because I do not like the show. Next year, I want to get more organized with all these activities, keep track of them, and what I like and what I don’t, so I can figure out how much I really want to see and what exactly.

To be continued

Books – 2025

Here is my year in books according to Goodreads.

I read more books than that, but unfortunately, a large percentage of the ones I read didn’t give me anything, and I regretted spending time on them. The most disappointing part was that I didn’t like any of the books from our book club at work. However, I am happy to report that I learned to drop the books I didn’t like without any guilt. Here are the last several books I read at the end of the year:

The Tipping Point. The full title of this book is The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference. Published 25 years ago, it’s considered a classic, and I think it’s a must-read for anyone who wants to understand how ideas are spread in society, and what can be done to promote progressive ideas or desired behavior. I didn’t read this book before, but I saw an advertisement about the next book, Revenge of the Tipping Point, and figured I needed to read the original one first.

Revenge is even more interesting; it explores social engineering, its faults, and offers a new perspective on the COVID pandemic and opioid crisis, among many other topics.

What we can know – A dystopia, the most interesting part of which is, in my opinion, how much the digital trace of our lives will reveal about the true us to our distant descendants.

Careless People – an explosive book, which I am glad I read. I am not disagreeing with those who say that the book is extremely subjective, and I can see the point of those who say that the author was not as naive as she presents herself, but still, I believe it. And somehow, it does not surprise me.

Books

Some (not all the books) I listened to and read recently.

The Tree of Knowledge – I liked it when I just started reading it; it looked like an interesting

The Dream Machine I LOVED this book! So many things we now take for granted, and you do not think that at some point, somebody came up with this idea! Things like “there shall be memory” :). Starting from the very first ideas, how a computer should be built, the concepts of processor and memory, the concept of a program as a set of commands, binary representation… I knew some bits and pieces of that history, but only some. Absolutely fascinating reading.

A Thousand Ships by Natalie Haynes. I liked it less than all the other books by the same author. I felt like she tried to talk about too many characters in one book, and it ended up being more shallow than some of her other books.

After the Spike – great book! The first book on the subject of (de)population and declining birth rates that I have ever come across, which discusses the real causes of the problem, rather than merely suggesting that “women should be paid more and daycare should be affordable.” Love how the authors talk about the “opportunity cost” and what we all can do about it.

The Rope Walker. I learned who Jaan Kross is when I visited Tallinn last January, and saw his sculpture on one of the Old Town streets. I wanted to find out who this person is, and I learned that he lived in Estonia all his life, including the years of Soviet and German occupation. And during all this time, he has been writing historical novels. He was very popular, and for some reason, he was never prosecuted, and his books were regularly published. At the same time, he continued to be deeply respected by everyone in the country.

Naturally, I wanted to read his books, and I discovered that his most popular trilogy had been translated into English. It took me a while to finish it, because I rarely have time to sit and read, and there is no audio version, but I loved it!

Honestly, I do not know how in the world Jaan Kross got away with writing this kind of book under Soviet occupation, but I guess they took it literally like he was talking about Germans 🙂

Regardless of political context, it’s a great book! I may be biased, because I love Tallinn, and I know not every street, but almost every building mentioned. When you read this book, you are completely immersed in the life of Medieval Tallinn; I felt like I could hear every sound, and smell every smell… I am on book three now!