26: The Theory of Everything: The Origin and Fate of the Universe, Stephen Hawking

Sometimes I wonder whether Hawking is a tremendous ass and whether his dry humour is a result of the difficulty he has in communicating.

In any case, this book could have done with some more editing. It's a popular scientific (very popular, no equation of any kind, no diagrams, no graphs) series of lectures (published before as The Cambridge Lectures: Life Works), and as a written work it's unfortunately repetitive. Not Hawking's best book.

Catching up: 19-25

19: The Devil's Teeth: A True Story of Obsession and Survival among America's Great White Sharks, Susan Casey

First of all, what's with "America's" in the subtitle? Does it really matter where these sharks live *part* of their lives? Anyway. This is a journalist's tale of hanging out on the Farallon Islands with the shark and bird biologists there. It's bloody interesting, and it's a damn' shame she went about it so unscientifically and, more or less, ended up destroying the shark study program.

It made me want to go out and do biology in unpleasant conditions.

20: Zatopek: Les Années Mimoun, Marcel Couchaux

French autobiographical comic about the author's father and Zatopek. Enjoyable.

21: How to Take a Chance, Darrell Huff and Irving Geis

More How to Lie with Statistics, but not as good, I think. I didn't really learn anything, and I didn't enjoy it as much as the "original".

22: Paper Tangos, Julie Taylor

There was an awful lot of fuzzy nonsense (the tango reflecting the Argentine revolution, blablablah, social anthropology, nonsense, nonsense, nonsense), but every now and then a good bit, like the on the cabeceo (page 38).

23: Conversations with Capote, Lawrence Grobel

Fun. Truman truly was a jerk at times. I found it interesting to learn that a) he hated the casting for the Breakfast at Tiffany's film (including Hepburn), and b) there were talks of a remake with Jodie Foster as Holly Golightly.

Anyway, a very interesting book that I enjoyed tremendously.

24: What If?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions, Randall Munroe

About half (?) was on the blog before. I don't know what to say. It's just more of the blog. Of course I enjoyed it.

25: The Man with the $100,000 Breasts and Other Gambling Stories, Michael Konik

Oh, dear. I can't resist stupid gambling stories, no matter how poorly written. This is another hack who proudly proclaims on the inner flap that he writes for Cigar Aficionado and is the editor of Delta Air Lines's Sky magazine. God help us. Anyway, the writing is more or less the bland vomit you'd expect. I still managed to enjoy the stories.