Okay, I really don't know where I found the recommendation for this book, or why exactly I picked it up to read, other than it is a book on writing. Except that this is a book on writing non-fiction, and, well, let's be real, I write fiction.

Unsurprisingly, however, I enjoyed the book. I read it more slowly than I normally read books because much of the advice McPhee gives is embedded in the stories he tells. The format of the book is some varied order of story-lesson-example repeated, with the themes of structure, editors, checkpoints, and the like.

The book is such a great book for writers, not only because McPhee is a fun writer with an intelligent moustache (his joke, read the book to understand), but also because the structure of the book is as instructive as the lessons in it. The book is so much more enjoyable in the story-telling than it would be with only the lessons.

Which is, one would think, one of the points.

The last part of the book talks about the confidence of writers and how words, any words, down for the first draft, are often the hardest part of writing. I do so appreciate this part of the book a lot. Draft No 4 is usually the winner, YMMV.

I appreciated this book a lot, for the stories, for the structure, and for the lessons. I strongly recommend the book for anyone who writes non-fiction, but not necessarily of the technical sort.

Even more so, however, new pieces can shoot up from other pieces, pursuing connections that run through the ground like rhizomes. Set one of these progressions in motion, and it will skein out in surprising ways, finally ending in some unexpected place.
Page 11

Rob Whiteley recommended this book to me, mentioning that the book is short, yet profound when it comes to determining what bullshit is, and what it is not.

The book is an essay on bullshit. Given the title, this should be obvious. It should have taken me about a half hour to read. I spent much longer reading it, because some parts of it were worth rereading and sitting with, before continuing.

Key points include: bullshit is different than lying, bullshit is closer to bluffing than lying, bullshitting is more acceptable than lying, and, as Rob quoted to me, not all speech is intended to express reality. Intent is also a part of bullshit, as is truth (specifically, not necessarily caring what the truth is at the moment).

The book is, as Rob says, worth a read. Most libraries have it. I recommended heading over to your nearest, sitting down with a cup of coffee, and reading it during lunch.

Also as Rob says:

The idea behind it is subtle but powerful.

It is just this lack of connection to a concern with truth — this indifference to how things really are — that I regard as of the essence of bullshit.
Page 33

What is distinctive about the sort of informal discussion among males that constitutes a bull session is, it seems to me, something like this: while the discussion may be intense and significant, it is in a certain respect not “for real.”
Page 35

It does seem that bullshitting involves a kind of bluff. It is closer to bluffing, surely, than to telling a lie.
Page 46

This is book 3 of the Imperial Radch trilogy As such, given how much I enjoyed the last two, and was engaged with the universe Leckie created, I continued with this one (and, let's be real, the next one, too).

Much as the previous two, this book has a society commentary aspect wrapped inside the science-fiction part of the world. In particular, this commentary is about power, the use of power, the corrupting influences of power, and the collateral damage of power. Standing up to power, saying the right thing, doing the right thing, it puts one at a complete disadvantage. One needs to have an entire acceptance of one's small part of this universe, to have acceptance of the meaninglessness of everything, and to have acceptance that, well, this is going to hurt, this standing up for one's ideals.

It's an ugly, nasty mess. Most people lose.

Some don't.

Some become the monsters they fight.

I vaguely recall that Susan and Rob didn't like this book as much as the first. If this is the case, and I am not sure it is the case, I would guess the lack of world building is part of the reduced excitement compared to the first book. This book starts two weeks after the last book ended, so the first book is needed to understand what is happening in this book.

This book doesn't nicely wrap up everything in the book, but it does wrap up some parts of the origins and destinations of some characters. The universe created is definitely one that can linger for a good one or two dozen books.

I personally enjoyed this book, both for the science-fiction part and the power play part. Again, recommended.

I wanted to like this book. I REALLY wanted to like this book.

I didn't like this book.

Not necessarily because it isn't a good book (well, maybe not necessarily), my mom enjoyed it, for example, but because it didn't actually say anything about Ikigai other than its definition.

The idea behide Ikigai is that if you have meaning if your life, you will be able to depending on that meaning through difficult times (resiliency), and have a reason to wake up in the morning. This meaning is part of the reason why people who live long live long.

Except that we don't really know why some people live longer than other people. Something something telomeres, which are barely mentioned in the book, be happy, have a strong community, be less stressful, eat lots of fruit - or was it vegetables, walk a lot, none of the people who live a long life actually KNOW why they live long. Some themes appear, but they don't KNOW.

The book is best described as skimming the surface of many reasons given why some people live longer than others (see above re: meaning, stress, community, exercise, vegetables). It tells us what but doesn't give how, or even offer any suggestion beyond "figure out what you're doing when you're in flow, and do more of that" to find meaning. I'm not against books that skim the surface of many topics, The Antidote and The Happiness Hypothesis are two of my favorite self-help books, and both are similar in their approach of "many ideas under one theme" that Ikigai uses.

Yet they work, and this one didn't. Unsure why.