This year I read the usual 50+ books, including the hilarious “Don’t Tell Mum I Work on the Rigs: She Thinks I’m a Piano Player In a Whorehouse” by Paul Carter. I enjoyed reading it so much that I immediately purchased and read the sequel “This is Not a Drill: Just Another Glorious Day in the Oilfield”, which is equally amusing. I also enjoyed reading Che Guevara’s Motorcycle Diaries (about his trip around Latin America in the 1950s), and then a book by Patrick Symmes that re-traced that Guevara’s journey in Latin America 50 years later (which makes it an even better book), and Guevara’s Guerilla Warfare – which I agree is way too much Guevara in a year.
Moreover, 2025 is the commemoration of Indonesian legendary writer Pramoedya Ananta Toer’s 100 years and I’ve managed to read 6 books by/about Pram. I also read books by the best of the best writers: Leo Tolstoy, Franz Kafka, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Paulo Coelho, Ernest Hemingway (2 books), Oscar Wilde, books by other Indonesian legends N.H Dini and Tan Malaka, a surprisingly bland book by Chuck Palahneuk, a thick-ass biography about Ian Fleming, a tale about the intellectual scene of 1940s New York City by Anatole Broyard, and a book that teaches about writing – “A Swim in a Pond in a Rain” – that uses Russian short stories as the examples. But probably the most touching fiction book I’ve read this year is “The Five People You Meet in Heaven.”
For the non-fiction portion, I read “The Longevity Diet” by Victor Longo after I first heard the news that my aunt had cancer (she’s thankfully fine now). I also read some of the most mind-bending, out-of-the-box, books such as “Infinite Game” (about different timelines to success), “Stealing Fire” (about group flow), “Range” (about jack of all trades vs master of one), “What the Dog Saw” (perspectives from the other side of the story), “Black Swan” (about sudden and unexpected events), “How Not to Be Wrong” (the application of math in the real world), “How to Work a Room” (about how to act and behave in social settings), and “The Organized Mind” (about storing knowledge in an age of information overload).
I also read the history of the Tudor dynasty, a book by a former Indonesian president Gus Dur, a very interesting story about Brazil as a footballing nation, the most fascinating history of punk music, a heavily paraphrased Xenophon’s Cyrus the Great (which was awful), and the most disturbing book I’ve read this year (but highly eye-opening and impactful): Virginia Giuffre’s autobiography “Nobody’s Girl.”
Moreover, in the religious month of Ramadan, this year I read a book about science and religion, stories of all the Prophets of Islam, a book about the great religions, a story about Jerusalem, and a book by a Zen Buddhist master.
And specifically for finance, I read “Warren Buffett’s Ground Rules” (about his partnership era, pre-Berkshire), “Utopia for Realists” (about Utopian thinking, where the author also formulate a realistic Utopia for modern world), and “The Way to Wealth” (tales of wealth from 17th century Japan). I also read a less impactful ones, “Smart Couple Finish Last”, and “The Complete 101 Collection” by John C. Maxwell; which I read after I reached 50 books target and wanted to just get done with some of the menial books I have in my pile.
Here are the full list of the books I’ve read in 2025:
- Tolstoy in Search of Truth and Meaning by Leo Tolstoy and Bob Blaisdell
- Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk by Legs McNeil and Gillian McCain
- Monumen by Nh. Dini
- Ernest Hemingway on Writing edited by Larry W. Phillips
- Larasati by Pramoedya Ananta Toer
- The Economics Book: Big Ideas Simply Explained by Niall Kishtainy
- Pramoedya Ananta Toer Dari Dekat Sekali by Koesalah Soebagyo Toer
- Guerilla Warfare by Ernesto Che Guevara
- Gus Dur on Religion, Democracy, and Peace edited by Hairus Salim HS
- Longevity Diet by Valter Longo, PhD
- The Infinite Game by Simon Sinek
- Manuscript Found in Accra by Paulo Coelho
- Cerita Dari Jakarta by Pramoedya Ananta Toer
- Saya Ingin Lihat Semua Ini Berakhir: Esei dan Wawancara Dengan Pramoedya Ananta Toer by August Hans den Boef and Kees Snoek
- Magisteria: The Entangled Histories of Science and Religion by Nicholas Spencer
- Stories of the Prophets by Ibn Kathir
- Beliefs That Changed the World: The History and Ideas of the Great Religions by John Bowker
- Jerusalem: One City, Three Faiths by Karen Armstrong
- Dropping Ashes on the Buddha by Stephen Mitchell
- Warren Buffett’s Ground Rules: Words of Wisdom From the Partnership Letters of the World’s Greatest Investor by Jeremy C. Miller
- Poor Folk by Fyodor Dostoevsky
- The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom
- The Castle by Franz Kafka
- Ian Fleming: The Complete Man by Nicholas Shakespeare
- Stealing Fire by Steven Kotler and Jamie Wheal
- How Not to Be Wrong: The Power of Mathematical Thinking by Jordan Ellenberg
- “The Invention of Sound” by Chuck Palahniuk
- Drama Mangir by Pramoedya Ananta Toer
- Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World by David Epstein
- Xenophon’s Cyrus the Great: The Arts of Leadership and War by Larry Hedrick
- Gadis Pantai by Pramoedya Ananta Toer
- A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
- Kafka Was the Rage by Anatole Broyard
- Utopia for Realists: And How We Can Get There by Rutger Bregman
- The Tudors: The Complete Story of England’s Most Notorious Dynasty by G. J. Meyer
- The Way to Wealth by Saikaku Ibara
- Don’t Tell Mum I Work on the Rigs: She Thinks I’m a Piano Player In a Whorehouse by Paul Carter
- A Swim in a Pond in a Rain by George Saunders
- Alyosha the Pot by Leo Tolstoy
- This is Not A Drill: Just Another Glorious Day in the Oilfield by Paul Carter
- Indonesia Tidak Hadir Di Bumi Manusia by Max Lane
- What the Dog Saw by Malcolm Gladwell
- The Motorcycle Diaries: Notes on a Latin American Journey by Ernesto Che Guevara
- Madilog by Tan Malaka
- How to Work a Room by Susan Roane
- Chasing Che: A Motorcycle Journey In Search of the Guevara Legend by Patrick Symmes
- The Black Swan by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
- Nobody’s Girl by Virginia Roberts Giuffre
- Futebol Nation by David Goldblatt
- The Organized Mind: Thinking Straight in the Age of Information Overload by Daniel J. Levitin
- Smart Couple Finish Rich by David Bach
- The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
- The Complete 101 Collection by John C. Maxwell
THE CHAOS THEORY 