Today we biked from Eureka to Austin, NV. For the most part, the ride was uneventful until a big climb at the end. Our campground was at the top of the hill so we'd have a nice downhill to start off the next day. Once we all arrived, we went into town for showers, a stop at Toiyabe Cafe, and dinner at International Cafe & Bar.
Since the ride was so uneventful, I finished listening to The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury, which means today's a great day for a book update!
For the last two days I've been reading The Martian Chronicles, a collection of short stories about the exploration of Mars. Bradbury touches on the idea of foreigners and exploration and has a very distinct and concise style, so this was a great biking book. Being out in the emptiness of Nevada made the idea of exploring the wilderness of Mars all the more relatable.
Before that, I listened to The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu. My friend actually bought me this book for a birthday a couple years ago but I've never had the time to sit down and read it. The writing and the voices were both really good (and Caralyn tells me the original untranslated writing is even more beautiful), but the plot of this book stalled at a few points. While the situation-at-hand is super interesting, I think sometimes it was exposed in less interesting ways. All that said, this book lays a really solid foundation for the next two books (for which I unfortunately haven't found an audiobook yet), so I really should go out and find them.
Before that, I listened to All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. I had been wanting to read this book for awhile, but I decided to take a break from war books, so I'd been punting it for a later date. Somewhere in Utah (or Colorado?) I decided it was time. Although sometimes I felt like this book lagged, in the end it had a really good build up and I really loved the final few chapters and all the build-up came to a head.
Next up on audiobook, I found The Dispossessed by Ursula Le Guin and Foundation by Isaac Asimov. The former was recommended to me by Caralyn and the latter I've actually already read before, but wanted a refresher before moving on to the next book in the series.
Meanwhile in the world of real books, I finally finished Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig. The book opens with an image of blackbirds flying by as the author and his son glided over a road. Throughout the rest of the book, he basically discusses his thoughts as he goes on this trip, many of which are really interesting and I definitely need to think more about later. It was a really fun book to read during the trip -- the right amounts of relatability, ideas, and questions to think about in the little random pockets of free time I have.
Next up for books, I might read Dune by Frank Herbert, but I think I might need a break from sci-fi for a bit.
Since this post is a bit late, I won't get too much into what everyone else has been reading, but here's a short (and probably incomplete) list:
Educated by Tara Westover
Hitchhiker's Ultimate Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng
Where the Crawdad's Sing by Delia Owens
Jitterbug Perfume by Tom Robbins
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer
There Are No Children Here by Alex Kotlowitz
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