I used to make a New Year’s resolution to not buy any books until I’ve finished the ones I’m reading. Ha ha ha ha ha ha! There are some new books coming out this year, so … let’s get ready!

January Books of 2026

She had fun fun fun ’til her daddy took her library card away

Anyway, top to bottom:

Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, Third Edition – Oxford: A classic dictionary of quotations and very fun. The best so far? ‘Those whom God wishes to destroy, he first makes mad’, attributed to Euripedes, but why not argue about it? He (Gott, not Euripedes) obviously to destroy DJT and is getting ready to do it. I got the book at the library sale across the street from my car repair shop, where I was having a funny noise in the right rear brake fixed. (There are no appropriate quotes in this book about brakes)
Vanishing Maps – Cristina Garcia: A recent Cristina Garcia novel which I had not read. She has a tendency just to write in whatever language her characters are speaking, perhaps this tendency was heightened by her novel ‘Here in Berlin’. Four generations of a family go all over the place, include Cuba, Russia, and Germany. Ja, Genau?
A history of the thermometer and its use in meteorology – Middleton: Sad to say this book is nearly incomprehensible to me because … the history of temperature is not that simple, even though by now the thermometer itself is fully worked out. There isn’t the shadow of a doubt about global warming, for example. I may not make it through this one.
Blowout – Rachel Maddow: The first book on oil I’ve had in my hand since reading “Oil on the Brain”, by Lisa Margonelli, the author of The Underbug, which is about termites. Actually, ‘Oil on the brain’ would be a good companion read. Also, ‘Oi on the brain’, if such a book existed. If it does, please do not let me know.
Breath of the gods: The History and Future of the Wind –Simon Winchester: I really liked Simon Winchester’s book on the history precision machining – the Perfectionists – a fun read and a great audio book too, so I got this one on the wind. For no reason whatsoever! Then I’m about three chapters in, and suddenly I realized that my daughter just got a sailboat. Which, in ideal circumstances, is powered by guess what?
Self defense – Daniel Davis: Very thoughtful book on the immune system, a complicated piece of work, that’s for sure. This looks like the first book in the stack that I will finish.
Frostbite – Nicola Twilley: The global refrigeration system. In the first chapter, in she goes, driving a forklift truck in a gigantic refrigerated warehouse. I remembered my grad school pal Clark Molstad, he’s like “I drive a forklift truck in the summer, I’m never giving that one up, it’s so fun”. Clark retired as a sociology prof a couple of years ago. I wrote to him to find out if he’s still driving the forklift in the summer. Spoiler alert about the book: It is NOT fun driving the forklift at minus oompty degrees.
Last Kings of Shanghai: The rival Jewish Dynasties that helped create Modern China – Jonathan KaufMan: This one is the selection of a history book club started by some friends, and I had low expectations since I took East Asian history in college, but the book, written by the WSJ Shanghai bureau chief, is super readable and fun. Various of my tai chi teachers have hailed from Shanghai. Likely to finish!
TR The Last Romantic - -HW Brands: I’ve been listening to the audio book. It’s massively long, but very good on Theodore Roosevelt’s youth and early life. H.W. Brands really did a lot of work, and a couple of Roosevelt experts have said “wow, I never heard that story before.” I had to check the hard copy out of the library in order to go into the footnotes.
The Oregon Trail – Rinker Buck: I picked this up at the library book sale, along with the Oxford Quotations and Rachel Maddow’s book on oil. I really like re-enactments, and had read Tim Severin’s retracing of the First Crusade expedition to Jerusalem. So, I knew Rinker Buck was out of his mind when he thought he could do this trail ride by himself. Fortunately, his crazy brother repairs wagons on the coast of Maine and he and the dog are coming along. Since I myself have ridden on a mule down into the Grand Canyon and back, I’m there for a good mule expedition story.
Dance of Life – Magdalena Zernicka Goetz, Roger Highfield: Cell development starting with where does asymmetry begin in the first cell division. From a hard working thoughtful scientist.
Lab Girl – Hope Jahren: Rereading this one, in the large print edition. Do you have a favorite tree? Did your life ever change in a day? Do you like to read about science? By the way, the author mentions an enormous monkeypod tree in the book, and you can totally look it up and get an aerial view on Google maps. They are pretty amazing trees
River of Shadows – Rebecca Solnit: So I was reading a re-release of Rebecca Solnit’s 2008 essay “Men explain things to me.”, which see. I suddenly realised from her retelling that I had read that 2008 essay, and never read the original book. Which, given my interests, sounded just terrific. The first sentence: “In the Spring of 1872, a man photographed a horse.” Guess who?
Simple Guide to Biomechanics and Fascia – Reese Langford: I did not find this as useful as the author hoped, but (so far) I have gotten a really useful warmup sequence out of it. 1: swing your arms in a figure eight 10 times. 2: rotate your hips ten times. 3: Do 10 bridges and 20 bridge marches 4: Childs pose to Cobra Stretch 10 times, then 5: 10 slow-motion walkout-and-back burpees. Also, I send all the reference links to Claude and asked for fascia exercises appropriate for golf, which I wrote about yesterday. Ha ha!
Story of French – Jean-Benoit Nadeau and Julie Barlow: I am determined to finish reading this this year. It is so fun and I have learned so much. Maybe I have too many books on the table, Oui?
The Case for Open Borders – John Washington: In the summer of 2025 I went over to the Campo de Cahunga, where the treaty ending the fighting over California by the US and Mexico. There was not yet, as such, really any border.
Enshittification – Cory Doctorow: This book, a gift from a friend, first outlines the shituation, and then propose what we can do to dump the problem. Regulation, self help, anti trust, restore worker power. Did you know the poo emoji is the least popular of all emojis? Fortunately the emoji only on the book cover, which can be removed. Don’t judge a book by its cover.
A study of Tai Chi Chuan – Sun Lutang, translated by Tim Cartmell: A move-by-move description of ‘Sun’ style Tai Chi by its founder, and translated by a Jiu-Jitsu master who has a school on Brookhurst street in Fountain Valley. If I still lived down there, I’d probably go over and learn Jiu Jitsu. My tai chi teacher doesn’t want us to read, just practice, but he also wants us to know all the movements’ names. Buddha didn’t want anyone to sleep, just practice, and Buddha was wrong too.
Why we sleep – Matthew Walker PhD: Why DO we sleep? There must be some reason. Meanwhile, this story appears in the book: So this guitar player (’I go to bed as usual with my guitar”) , let’s call him Keith, keeps a cassette tape record next to his bed, just in case he has an idea.
And so, from “Why we Sleep”, we have the following account:: “He describes the following experience on May 7, 1965, after having returned to his hotel room in Clearwater, Florida, following a performance that evening: >>”I go to bed as usual with my guitar, and I wake up the next morn-ing, and I see that the tape is run to the very end. And I think, “Well, I didn’t do anything. Maybe I hit a button when I was asleep.” So I put it back to the beginning and pushed play and there, in some sort of ghostly version, is [the opening lines to “Satisfaction”]. It was a whole verse of it. And after that, there’s 40 minutes of me snor-ing. But there’s the song in its embryo, and I actually dreamt the damned thing.”<< (the answer of why we sleep is thus implied)
The sleep revolution: transforming your life one night at a time – Arianna Huffington: Really a surprisingly good and comprehensive guide on sleep. Also, references to other classics like the children’s book, or perhaps rather a desperate parents’ book in children’s format form, “Go the F**K to sleep”. And yes, I did check that one out of the library!
Sleep Groove – Walch PhD: I picked this up at the Last Wag of the Dog’s Tail bookshop on Mission Hill in San Francisco. It introduces the novel concept of, instead of shooting for 8 hours of sleep, try for 8.5 hours in bed in a dark room. It’s all about context. Also saw Tom Levenson’s book “So Very Small”, on the topic of the discovery (WHAT TOOK SO LONG YOU MAY WANT TO KNOW) of the germ theory of disease. Buy it and read it, and get his next one, and his other books, at ThomasLevenson.com
Sleep for Success – James Maas and Rebecca S. Robbins: The summary book after the blockbuster Power Sleep. I got this for review, and in memoriam after Maas, who taught the largest college lecture course in history at Cornell, passed away last year.
RestFul Web APIs (O’Reilly book with Sloth on cover) – Richardson & Amundson: This one is just in here as a joke, underneath all the sleep books. Ha ha ha! Yes, they really did put a sloth on the cover of the RESTful APIs book!

--- title: "Great big stack o' books January 2026" format: html: css: book-a-style.css author: "George Girton" date: "2026-01-06" categories: [books] image: "Book-Stack-2026-January.png" draft: false --- I used to make a New Year's resolution to not buy any books until I've finished the ones I'm reading. Ha ha ha ha ha ha! There are some new books coming out this year, so ... let's get ready! # January Books of 2026 ![She had fun fun fun 'til her daddy took her library card away](Book-Stack-2026-January.png) Anyway, top to bottom: ::: {.book-list} Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, Third Edition -- Oxford : A classic dictionary of quotations and very fun. The best so far? 'Those whom God wishes to destroy, he first makes mad', attributed to Euripedes, but why not argue about it? He (Gott, not Euripedes) obviously to destroy DJT and is getting ready to do it. I got the book at the library sale across the street from my car repair shop, where I was having a funny noise in the right rear brake fixed. (There are no appropriate quotes in this book about brakes) Vanishing Maps -- Cristina Garcia : A recent Cristina Garcia novel which I had not read. She has a tendency just to write in whatever language her characters are speaking, perhaps this tendency was heightened by her novel 'Here in Berlin'. Four generations of a family go all over the place, include Cuba, Russia, and Germany. Ja, Genau? A history of the thermometer and its use in meteorology -- Middleton : Sad to say this book is nearly incomprehensible to me because ... the history of temperature is not that simple, even though by now the thermometer itself is fully worked out. There isn't the shadow of a doubt about global warming, for example. I may not make it through this one. Blowout -- Rachel Maddow : The first book on oil I've had in my hand since reading "Oil on the Brain", by Lisa Margonelli, the author of The Underbug, which is about termites. Actually, 'Oil on the brain' would be a good companion read. Also, 'Oi on the brain', if such a book existed. If it does, please do not let me know. Breath of the gods: The History and Future of the Wind --Simon Winchester : I really liked Simon Winchester's book on the history precision machining -- the Perfectionists -- a fun read and a great audio book too, so I got this one on the wind. For no reason whatsoever! Then I'm about three chapters in, and suddenly I realized that my daughter just got a sailboat. Which, in ideal circumstances, is powered by guess what? Self defense -- Daniel Davis : Very thoughtful book on the immune system, a complicated piece of work, that's for sure. This looks like the first book in the stack that I will finish. Frostbite -- Nicola Twilley : The global refrigeration system. In the first chapter, in she goes, driving a forklift truck in a gigantic refrigerated warehouse. I remembered my grad school pal Clark Molstad, he's like "I drive a forklift truck in the summer, I'm never giving that one up, it's so fun". Clark retired as a sociology prof a couple of years ago. I wrote to him to find out if he's still driving the forklift in the summer. Spoiler alert about the book: It is NOT fun driving the forklift at minus oompty degrees. Last Kings of Shanghai: The rival Jewish Dynasties that helped create Modern China -- Jonathan KaufMan : This one is the selection of a history book club started by some friends, and I had low expectations since I took East Asian history in college, but the book, written by the WSJ Shanghai bureau chief, is super readable and fun. Various of my tai chi teachers have hailed from Shanghai. Likely to finish! TR The Last Romantic - -HW Brands : I've been listening to the audio book. It's massively long, but very good on Theodore Roosevelt's youth and early life. H.W. Brands really did a lot of work, and a couple of Roosevelt experts have said "wow, I never heard that story before." I had to check the hard copy out of the library in order to go into the footnotes. The Oregon Trail -- Rinker Buck : I picked this up at the library book sale, along with the Oxford Quotations and Rachel Maddow's book on oil. I really like re-enactments, and had read Tim Severin's retracing of the First Crusade expedition to Jerusalem. So, I knew Rinker Buck was out of his mind when he thought he could do this trail ride by himself. Fortunately, his crazy brother repairs wagons on the coast of Maine and he and the dog are coming along. Since I myself have ridden on a mule down into the Grand Canyon and back, I'm there for a good mule expedition story. Dance of Life -- Magdalena Zernicka Goetz, Roger Highfield : Cell development starting with where does asymmetry begin in the first cell division. From a hard working thoughtful scientist. Lab Girl -- Hope Jahren : Rereading this one, in the large print edition. Do you have a favorite tree? Did your life ever change in a day? Do you like to read about science? By the way, the author mentions an enormous monkeypod tree in the book, and you can totally look it up and get an aerial view on Google maps. They _are_ [pretty amazing trees](https://www.liliuokalanigardens.org/plants-of-liliuokalani-gardens/monkey-pod-tree) River of Shadows -- Rebecca Solnit : So I was reading a [re-release of Rebecca Solnit's 2008 essay "Men explain things to me."](https://www.guernicamag.com/rebecca-solnit-men-explain-things-to-me/), which see. I suddenly realised from her retelling that I had read that 2008 essay, and never read the original book. Which, given my interests, sounded just terrific. The first sentence: "In the Spring of 1872, a man photographed a horse." Guess who? Simple Guide to Biomechanics and Fascia -- Reese Langford : I did not find this as useful as the author hoped, but (so far) I have gotten a really useful warmup sequence out of it. 1: swing your arms in a figure eight 10 times. 2: rotate your hips ten times. 3: Do 10 bridges and 20 [bridge marches](https://complete-pilates.co.uk/marching-bridge/) 4: Childs pose to Cobra Stretch 10 times, then 5: 10 slow-motion walkout-and-back burpees. Also, I send all the reference links to Claude and asked for fascia exercises appropriate for golf, which I wrote about yesterday. Ha ha! Story of French -- Jean-Benoit Nadeau and Julie Barlow : I am determined to finish reading this this year. It is so fun and I have learned so much. Maybe I have too many books on the table, Oui? The Case for Open Borders -- John Washington : In the summer of 2025 I went over to the Campo de Cahunga, where the treaty ending the fighting over California by the US and Mexico. There was not yet, as such, really any border. Enshittification -- Cory Doctorow : This book, a gift from a friend, first outlines the shituation, and then propose what we can do to dump the problem. Regulation, self help, anti trust, restore worker power. Did you know the poo emoji is the least popular of all emojis? Fortunately the emoji only on the book cover, which can be removed. Don't judge a book by its cover. A study of Tai Chi Chuan -- Sun Lutang, translated by Tim Cartmell : A move-by-move description of 'Sun' style Tai Chi by its founder, and translated by a Jiu-Jitsu master who has a school on Brookhurst street in Fountain Valley. If I still lived down there, I'd probably go over and learn Jiu Jitsu. My tai chi teacher doesn't want us to read, just practice, but he also wants us to know all the movements' names. Buddha didn't want anyone to sleep, just practice, and Buddha was wrong too. Why we sleep -- Matthew Walker PhD : Why DO we sleep? There must be some reason. Meanwhile, this story appears in the book: So this guitar player ('I go to bed as usual with my guitar") , let's call him Keith, keeps a cassette tape record next to his bed, just in case he has an idea. And so, from "Why we Sleep", we have the following account: : "He describes the following experience on May 7, 1965, after having returned to his hotel room in Clearwater, Florida, following a performance that evening: >>"I go to bed as usual with my guitar, and I wake up the next morn-ing, and I see that the tape is run to the very end. And I think, "Well, I didn't do anything. Maybe I hit a button when I was asleep." So I put it back to the beginning and pushed play and there, in some sort of ghostly version, is [the opening lines to "Satisfaction"]. It was a whole verse of it. And after that, there's 40 minutes of me snor-ing. But there's the song in its embryo, and I actually dreamt the damned thing."<< (the answer of why we sleep is thus implied) The sleep revolution: transforming your life one night at a time -- Arianna Huffington : Really a surprisingly good and comprehensive guide on sleep. Also, references to other classics like the children's book, or perhaps rather a desperate parents' book in children's format form, "Go the F**K to sleep". And yes, I did check that one out of the library! Sleep Groove -- Walch PhD : I picked this up at the Last Wag of the Dog's Tail bookshop on Mission Hill in San Francisco. It introduces the novel concept of, instead of shooting for 8 hours of sleep, try for 8.5 hours in bed in a dark room. It's all about context. Also saw Tom Levenson's book "So Very Small", on the topic of the discovery (WHAT TOOK SO LONG YOU MAY WANT TO KNOW) of the germ theory of disease. Buy it and read it, and get his next one, and his other books, at [ThomasLevenson.com](https://ThomasLevenson.com) Sleep for Success -- James Maas and Rebecca S. Robbins : The summary book after the blockbuster Power Sleep. I got this for review, and in memoriam after Maas, who taught the largest college lecture course in history at Cornell, passed away last year. RestFul Web APIs (O'Reilly book with Sloth on cover) -- Richardson & Amundson : This one is just in here as a joke, underneath all the sleep books. Ha ha ha! Yes, they really did put a sloth on the cover of the RESTful APIs book! :::