en-US Wed, 28 May 2025 11:12:23 -0700 60 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg Comment291119729 Wed, 28 May 2025 11:12:23 -0700 /review/show/2007303527 Patrick's review of 1984
by George Orwell

Update from 8 years later - our ending is looking very similar to Winston's. ]]> Review982620434 Wed, 28 May 2025 10:49:14 -0700 /review/show/982620434 Patrick gave 5 stars to Your Fathers, Where Are They? And the Prophets, Do They Live Forever? (Paperback) by Dave Eggers
bookshelves: books-read-in-2018, existentialism-on-prom-night
I totally get why people wouldn't like this book. Completely understand and appreciate it. A borderline magical realism book consisting only of dialogue with an ambiguous ending that leaves you wondering what's real and what's not (if any of it even is at all)? I get it, man. But holy crap is this right in my wheelhouse. Plot is overrated. "Before the Fall" was overflowing with plot, and it was kind of crappy. I'd much rather be immersed in a book full of subtle ideas and philosophical discussions for which there are no real answers. Pump it directly into my veins, I can't get enough.

As much as I enjoyed 'The Circle,' this is the Dave Eggers I fell in love with. Frank, honest discussions about life and the social contract, what does it all mean type of shit with no easy answers. The protagonist of this book is not right in his general philosophy of life, but he's not wrong, either. The world is an imperfect place, and just because you've been given advantages in life doesn't mean you're on easy street. Everyone's personal experience and the ways we interpret that experience is unique, and it's not fair to minimize people's struggles. But that doesn't mean you get to throw a brick through the window of the happy family next door, either.

If that doesn't make any sense, okay. But that's like, my opinion, man. And it's why I loved this wacky book. I couldn't put it down. My faith in Dave Eggers's staggering genius is restored, but I still understand if you disagree for all sorts of reasons. You're not wrong. But neither am I. ]]> ReadStatus9479330080 Wed, 28 May 2025 09:48:03 -0700 /review/show/7607151190 Patrick is currently reading Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder by Salman Rushdie
]]> Review7579752689 Wed, 28 May 2025 08:48:15 -0700 /review/show/7579752689 Patrick gave 4 stars to Fahrenheit-182: A Memoir (Hardcover) by Mark Hoppus
bookshelves: books-read-in-2025, rock-n-roll-bios
I was obsessed with blink-182 from about the ages of 15 - 20, or in terms of blink's discography, from Dude Ranch through Take Off Your Pants and Jacket. I think this is exactly the right age to be obsessed with blink, but your mileage may vary.

Truthfully, blink changed my life and the way I enjoy music. I'd always liked music, but never had a band or artist that felt like it belonged to me. When I was a kid, I just listened to what my parents liked (my dad was fond of folk and new wave, as well as classic rock, and my mom liked classic rock with a little bit of a heavier edge, like Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin), or just Disney soundtracks (The Lion King Soundtrack was the first CD I ever owned) or whatever pop music was trending (Ace of Base was the second). We listened to the local radio, WBCN (my dad) and WAAF (my mom), and I liked it all well enough.

Basically, I liked music, but I was just kind of floating through it, not really super passionate about anything. If you'd asked me my favorite band in 1996, I would have said Harvey Danger or Third Eye Blind (and I have no shame about that - Third Eye Blind is basically perfect power pop, and Harvey Danger are actually a really underrated band that was much more than just 'Flagpole Sitta', but I digress). But once I purchased Dude Ranch (based on a love of the hit single 'Dammit'), everything changed. I was admittedly a little late to the party - I didn't purchase it right when it came out, and might have even gotten it either right before or right after 'Enema of the State' came out), but I made up for lost time immediately. I listed to both 'Dude Ranch' and 'Enema' constantly, and once I'd played those out, I completely exhausted blink's much rougher back catalogue in 'Cheshire Cat' and 'Buddha' (my high school girlfriend especially hated 'Buddha' because she said it sounded like it was recorded in someone's garage, which was honestly fair and pretty accurate).

From there, I genuinely needed a fix of something more, and that led me to punk and emo as a genre writ large. I got into 'Saves the Day' and 'Jimmy Eat World' and 'The Get Up Kids', 'New Found Glory' and 'Alkaline Trio' and 'Hot Rod Circuit' and countless other bands to the point that it basically became my identity for a few years. And I loved it all, and frankly, still love most of those bands to this day (I've actually seen most of those bands live in just the last couple of years. As Matt Pryor says, I love reunion shows.)

But in the meantime, blink-182 became kind of an afterthought, which was unthinkable to 16 year old me. I actually remember the exact moment that I was kind of done with them. I was at Warped Tour (of course), and was crowdsurfing during blink's set, and I was feeling pretty cool, pretty pumped about it. But I was like, I think 20 at the time, which isn't super old, but as I was up there, they were playing 'Anthem Part Two', and Tom was singing 'corporate leaders, politicians, kids can't vote, adults elect them.' And I was looking out from my bird's eye view at a crowd of literal kids passionately singing it back to them, and I felt like a fucking idiot. I wasn't a kid. I was an adult at that point, at least legally speaking. And I did vote in the previous election - I proudly cast my vote for Al Gore, and was horrified when George W. Bush won instead. And that sucked, but it's not like I didn't have a say. And Mark and Tom were even older than me - what the hell were they talking about? Why were they singing about shit like that when they were, very much adults. Did Tom even vote in the 2000 election? If not, what the hell is he complaining about?

To say it triggered a bit of an existential crisis for me is probably dramatic, but it definitely forced me to re-think what I considered good music. And blink-182, for all the great riffs and catchy choruses, felt a little juvenile. And that's not who I wanted to be, as a person.

And now, over 20 years later, holding Mark Hoppus's biography in a Barnes & Noble, I was tempted to just chuckle to myself and put it back. But then I realized, I actually wanted to hear what he had to say for himself. I was vaguely aware of all the drama that followed blink after I left them in 2001/2 (the last blink album I bought was 'Take Off Your Pants and Jacket', and it was probably also the last one I listened to in full even in the streaming era, give or take a spin of 'California' out of morbid curiosity with the addition of Matt Skiba, who I loved from Alkaline Trio, a band I actually continued to follow for many more years after I left blink behind, and still do to this day - Blood Hair and Eyeballs is a certified banger), and I was curious how much of the dirt he'd spill. So I bought it.

I'm glad I did. I've been on a bit of a binge of 2000s emo biographies and scene histories (notably Dan Ozzi's 'Sellout' which was great, as well as Matt Pryor's memoir, which was also great, and Andrew McMahon's autobiography, which was also great), so why not check out another one? And although it's pretty surface-level - Mark never digs too deep on anything - it does offer up real answers on the big questions blink fans have been wondering about, and it doesn't pull punches or duck accountability for mistakes made (although it doesn't dwell on them, either).

And frankly, it explains a lot. He explains how the band came into being - essentially, his sister's friend introduced him and Tom and it was basically a 'Step Brothers' "did we just become best friends?" moment; how Scott Raynor got kicked to the curb - he was never really more than an acquaintance to those guys, and never totally fit in, so when they met Travis, and Scott's drinking had admittedly become a bit of a problem, they realized they could take things to another level if they booted him. It was shitty, and I think Mark owns that, but also, do they become international superstars without Travis? I think the answer is probably no. His talent, punk rock edge, and natural rock star energy gave them exactly what they needed to reach that next level.

Why did Tom quit the band in the first place? I think Tom needs to really answer that one, because it actually seemed really hurtful to Mark and I think he's kind of grasping for answers there as well. But my read on it based on Mark's account is actually pretty similar to that moment I described earlier from Warped Tour. I think Tom was sick of being a joke, and he wanted to become an adult, and he didn't feel like he was able to do that while he was in blink-182. And so he resented the band, but especially Mark, since the money and fame was too much to walk away from. So he just kind of distanced himself more and more until the whole thing became untenable. Sometimes you just grow apart from your best friends, but usually when that happens, there isn't an international tour and multi-record contract that forces you to keep hanging out. When there is, it just kind of curdles.

It seemed like the whole situation was tough for Mark, and I understand why. He fundamentally hasn't changed from who he was in blink's heyday, whereas Mark is a totally different person, for better or worse. But it was perplexing to Mark why his best friend didn't want to be friends anymore. It was 'Banshees of Inisherin' on the world's stage, and the livelihood of countless people relied on the relationship being salvaged. But you can't force something like that.

Mark gets into all of it from his perspective, and it's really interesting. It would be cool if Dan Ozzi would meet with Tom and Travis and all the other people involved in blink and wrote a definitive account from all sides, but if that doesn't happen, I think this will suffice. It's pretty clear what happened, and I can't help but feel bad for Mark, his countless riches and incredible life notwithstanding.

He touches on Skiba joining the band, but only just. Matt comes off like the best possible hired gun, and it's clear that Mark appreciates him and everything he did to keep blink going while Tom was gone, but it's like a rebound girlfriend when you're not over your ex. He barely gets into it. I'm glad Alkaline Trio stayed together through all of it, and honestly, the new stuff is some of the best they've done in years, so maybe he was reinvigorated by the whole experience too.

Finally, he digs into his cancer and remission. It's painfully honest and I'm really happy he beat it. The bottom line is Mark Hoppus comes off as exactly who you'd expect him to be - just a really nice, chill dude who loves music and his friends and family. And even though I'd kind of left blink-182 in the past, it's still a huge part of the person I am today, and they hold a place in my heart forever. And for that reason, I'm glad I read the book, because it was affirming in virtually every way - the band is great, Mark's a really good guy, and I have answers to all of my questions. It's a breezy, funny, and interesting read. And you can't ask for much more than that. Maybe a great steering wheel that doesn't fly out of your hands while you're driving, but definitely not more than that. ]]> Review7534710851 Sun, 18 May 2025 13:43:52 -0700 /review/show/7534710851 Patrick gave 5 stars to In My Time of Dying: How I Came Face to Face with the Idea of an Afterlife (Hardcover) by Sebastian Junger
bookshelves: books-read-in-2025, existentialism-on-prom-night
An incredible and thoughtful work of creative non-fiction. After weeks of painful - but transient - pain in his abdomen, author and journalist Sebastian Junger has a terrifying, surreal dream where he is dead and trying to reach his family, but they're unable to see or hear him. The next day, he is felled by an aneurysm in his pancreatic artery, and nearly dies in his driveway. Through his wife's courage and persistence, he is rushed to the hospital and, although it's touch and go for many hours, is eventually saved. During his ordeal, only tangentially aware that he is, in fact, dying, he sees his dead father, floating above his bed, beckoning him to follow him into a dark blackness beside his hospital gurney. He refuses, and thanks to the ingenuity of the doctors treating him, is brought back from the brink.

What does that do to a person? One of my favorite shows is 'The Good Place' because of the way it grapples head-on with the concept of death (in addition to being hilarious). Towards the end of the show, one of the characters perfectly sums up the cognitive dissonance required to enjoy a life that, we all know, eventually ends, and we never know exactly when that will occur. "All humans are aware of death, so we're all a little bit sad, all the time. That's just the deal." But most of the time, we're able to push that sadness at bay, and live our lives. It's a lot harder to do that when death walks up to you, slaps you in the face, and reminds you that he's coming.

The way Junger dealt with it was by using his journalistic background and skills to write this book. In the book, he recounts previous brushes with death in his life -- a surfing accident when he was younger, the death of a friend in a war zone that he was supposed to be dispatched to, but the friend went instead, a night in a foreign land where he didn't speak the language and had nowhere to sleep as the temperature dropped. All were harrowing and profound for him, but he didn't have to grapple with his mortality to the same degree. So he digs in, interviewing the doctors and nurses who worked on him, and sharing the story of his near death in painstaking detail, supplementing what he's able to remember with their sides of it, and piecing together the miracle of his survival bit by bit.

Then he discusses the history of humans' near-death experiences through time, discussing different theories and accounts, and comparing it to his own experience. It's an interesting account, and gets deeply philosophical. These sections were my favorite, because here is Junger, a self-avowed atheist, confronting the concept of an afterlife, and the origins of the universe, and particle physics, and what any of it all means.

The conclusion? We don't know. We can't know. It's possibly unknowable - he even considers the idea that the act of knowing could bring about the end of the universe (it sounds crazy, but it actually makes sense in context, and the concept of the "observer effect" - the scientific phenomenon of quantum particles acting different when observed than when not observed - lends it legitimate credence). The more we learn about the universe, the less sure we can be about anything.

I went into this book fairly certain in my concept of the afterlife - it doesn't exist. It's exactly like a dreamless sleep, or the world before you were born. There's something, and then there's nothing, and it's all happening without you. It's scary, but it makes sense to me. Now? I'm not so sure. I'm open to pretty much anything, which is actually a better way to feel about things, I suppose. Either way, I can honestly say that this book changed me. It was thoughtful, engaging, and very well-written, and really challenged my preconceived notions of life and the universe. Hard to ask for more than that in a book. ]]> ReadStatus9440080997 Sun, 18 May 2025 13:43:46 -0700 /review/show/7579752689 Patrick is currently reading Fahrenheit-182: A Memoir by Mark Hoppus
]]> Review7534710851 Sun, 18 May 2025 13:19:51 -0700 /review/show/7534710851 Patrick gave 5 stars to In My Time of Dying: How I Came Face to Face with the Idea of an Afterlife (Hardcover) by Sebastian Junger
bookshelves: books-read-in-2025, existentialism-on-prom-night
An incredible and thoughtful work of creative non-fiction. After weeks of painful - but transient - pain in his abdomen, author and journalist Sebastian Junger has a terrifying, surreal dream where he is dead and trying to reach his family, but they're unable to see or hear him. The next day, he is felled by an aneurysm in his pancreatic artery, and nearly dies in his driveway. Through his wife's courage and persistence, he is rushed to the hospital and, although it's touch and go for many hours, is eventually saved. During his ordeal, only tangentially aware that he is, in fact, dying, he sees his dead father, floating above his bed, beckoning him to follow him into a dark blackness beside his hospital gurney. He refuses, and thanks to the ingenuity of the doctors treating him, is brought back from the brink.

What does that do to a person? One of my favorite shows is 'The Good Place' because of the way it grapples head-on with the concept of death (in addition to being hilarious). Towards the end of the show, one of the characters perfectly sums up the cognitive dissonance required to enjoy a life that, we all know, eventually ends, and we never know exactly when that will occur. "All humans are aware of death, so we're all a little bit sad, all the time. That's just the deal." But most of the time, we're able to push that sadness at bay, and live our lives. It's a lot harder to do that when death walks up to you, slaps you in the face, and reminds you that he's coming.

The way Junger dealt with it was by using his journalistic background and skills to write this book. In the book, he recounts previous brushes with death in his life -- a surfing accident when he was younger, the death of a friend in a war zone that he was supposed to be dispatched to, but the friend went instead, a night in a foreign land where he didn't speak the language and had nowhere to sleep as the temperature dropped. All were harrowing and profound for him, but he didn't have to grapple with his mortality to the same degree. So he digs in, interviewing the doctors and nurses who worked on him, and sharing the story of his near death in painstaking detail, supplementing what he's able to remember with their sides of it, and piecing together the miracle of his survival bit by bit.

Then he discusses the history of humans' near-death experiences through time, discussing different theories and accounts, and comparing it to his own experience. It's an interesting account, and gets deeply philosophical. These sections were my favorite, because here is Junger, a self-avowed atheist, confronting the concept of an afterlife, and the origins of the universe, and particle physics, and what any of it all means.

The conclusion? We don't know. We can't know. It's possibly unknowable - he even considers the idea that the act of knowing could bring about the end of the universe (it sounds crazy, but it actually makes sense in context, and the concept of the "observer effect" - the scientific phenomenon of quantum particles acting different when observed than when not observed - lends it legitimate credence). The more we learn about the universe, the less sure we can be about anything.

I went into this book fairly certain in my concept of the afterlife - it doesn't exist. It's exactly like a dreamless sleep, or the world before you were born. There's something, and then there's nothing, and it's all happening without you. It's scary, but it makes sense to me. Now? I'm not so sure. I'm open to pretty much anything, which is actually a better way to feel about things, I suppose. Either way, I can honestly say that this book changed me. It was thoughtful, engaging, and very well-written, and really challenged my preconceived notions of life and the universe. Hard to ask for more than that in a book. ]]> Review7468001297 Thu, 01 May 2025 07:28:17 -0700 /review/show/7468001297 Patrick gave 5 stars to Abundance (Hardcover) by Ezra Klein
bookshelves: books-read-in-2025, fight-the-oligarchy
Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson writing a book together is like a nerdy millennial's 'Avengers' team-up. It's hilarious to me, because when I discovered Derek Thompson a few years ago, my first thought was "this guy is like a younger Ezra Klein!" I started listening to his podcast, "Plain English" and really admired his intellectual honesty and curiosity. He had a great perspective and non-judgmental way of approaching big problems that reminded me of the early days of 'Vox,' Ezra Klein's old website (which, while still pretty good, isn't the same without him).

So obviously I'm the target demo for this book. And it's a good read, for sure, and there are lots of big ideas and a utopian future that is attainable. But ultimately, I left it feeling pretty bummed, as I'm sure if you got a couple of drinks in either of the venerable authors, they would cop to as well. Because the truth is, while the possibility of the abundant future that Klein and Thompson paint in this book is theoretically attainable, the political will to make it happen is sorely lacking.

Let's start with the problem of government gridlock - Klein and Thompson do a great job of explaining why it exists and how we got here. The tl;dr is that liberals got too attached to ensuring every demographic got served in every project, to the point of paralysis, and conservatives saw that it was a great way to gum up the works and jumped aboard. And while they point to some examples of that gridlock being overcome - mostly notably in Josh Shapiro's prioritization of expediency in the clean up of a bridge collapse in PA - the current political climate doesn't seem to have the ability to do anything but deport people illegally and crash the economy.

Scientific research is another area where they do a great job of explaining how things have slowed down significantly, but also highlight areas where we can speed it back up again - Operation Warp Speed, ironically, being the prime example. But once again, even though this book was literally just published a couple of months ago, it's like the Trump administration got an advance copy and used it as a textbook of what not to do, as they've completely cratered the scientific research community in this country by slashing federal funding to hospitals and universities like a drunk lumberjack. Federal funding is the lifeblood of this industry, and as Klein and Thompson note, scientific research is not linear. Research into one random area can create life-saving medical advances in another. But once again, the Trump administration is, to put it kindly, too myopic (or perhaps willfully ignorant) to understand that, and so instead of funding these ventures, they hold it up as prime examples of wasteful government spending and rob future generations of potentially world-changing discoveries.

My only hope is that this administration's abundant failures create an opportunity for a new and better tomorrow. Klein and Thompson discuss it in their conclusion - for whatever reason, Americans are only galvanized by disaster, but that galvanization can create a lasting good. Given that the 2nd Trump administration is already a complete and utter disaster, we can only hope that we can build something great from the ashes. If we do, this book will provide the roadmap. ]]> Review7456502154 Thu, 01 May 2025 07:28:07 -0700 /review/show/7456502154 Patrick gave 5 stars to Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism (Hardcover) by Sarah Wynn-Williams
bookshelves: books-read-in-2025, fight-the-oligarchy
The book Facebook doesn't want you to read, and I can understand why (although those fascists can go to hell, you should absolutely read it).

Nothing in the book is honestly that surprising when you take stock of what has happened over the last 15 years. Mark Zuckerberg is revealed to be a naive, sniveling egomaniac whose singular focus on growing his business at all costs stems not so much from evil narcissism as much as a lack of understanding of the real world, and the stakes therein. In Wynn-Williams telling, he comes across as a naive bozo and egomaniac - truly a lethal combination for the rest of the world.

Sheryl "Lean In" Sandberg is revealed to be a complete and total fraud. Shocking, I know. But anyone who worked in the business world during the Obama years has heard people fawn over her supposedly revolutionary view of women in the workplace, another in a long line of charlatans selling women a fantasy of having it all. The reality is that she treats the women who work for her harder than anyone, and also has weird and frankly creepy quirks that she thrusts upon them (the scene where Sandberg insists that Wynn-Williams join her in her private plane's bedroom to snuggle and rest(?) on the way back from a work trip was particularly jarring).

Wynn-Williams feels like a reliable narrator to me. The things she shares about the company make sense in context, and history has certainly vindicated her side of things. Facebook's "move fast and break things" mentality was fun and cute in the halcyon days of the 2010s, but when the things being broken turn out to be global democracy, it's less a cute mantra and more a statement of purpose by an even capitalist regime. Their subsequent capitulation to Trump comes as no surprise when you see how Zuckerberg bent over backwards to please his Chinese overlords to ensure that Facebook breaks into that territory. No compromise is too great for Zuck and company as long as they make all the money they possibly can.

It's a must read, and Wynn-Williams does a great job moving the narrative along. I genuinely felt bad for her. The book is chock-full of horrible anecdotes that show how little anyone at Facebook cares for anyone or anything other than making the most money possible. It's sycophants and monsters all the way down from the top of that org chart, and many of the worst people in the book are still there, ruining the world one Instagram post at a time.

I looked Wynn-Williams up on LinkedIn, and it doesn't look like she's done much in the corporate world post-FB. Understandable, since they probably blacklisted her in the industry for actually caring about morals and values, and you can't help but think this book was an both an opportunity to set the record straight as well as support her family given that Facebook has essentially ruined her career. It's a shame that Facebook has tried to weaponize that against her, but not surprising. She seems like a genuinely good person who was trying to do good for an evil company - the problem was, their rosy rhetoric in the last decade made it seem like they actually gave a shit about anything other than their bottom line. Silly us for buying it. ]]> ReadStatus9279011458 Thu, 01 May 2025 07:27:36 -0700 /review/show/7456502154 Patrick finished reading Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism by Sarah Wynn-Williams
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