My Top 3 books of 2022
In 2022, I read 18 books, which equates to a little more than one book every three weeks. Although this is not a large number of books, it's my personal best, so I wanted to take a moment to write about the three best books I read last year.
🚀 Project Hail Mary:
This was the best sci-fi book I read in 2022. I was struck by the friendship between Grace (a human) and Rocky (an alien). In many popular forms of media, alien contact often results in conflict, but in this novel, the attitude on both sides is different when all living things are at risk of extinction. Grace and Rocky work together to solve the problem of the astrophage, a life-form that eats stars by absorbing vast amounts of energy, procreating, and repeating the process. Grace is a scientist, and Rocky is an engineer, so they work exceptionally well together.
Besides the bond between the two main characters, I appreciated Grace's backstory. He's an overqualified high school teacher who used to be a microbiologist. However, he left academia in frustration after calling out prominent microbiologists in his final paper. Throughout his life, Grace has been running away from his duties. Even now, he doesn't want to go on the Hail Mary mission because it's a suicide mission, but he's the best person for the job, so he's forced to go. In the end, he redeems himself by choosing to save Rocky and sacrificing his only chance of returning to Earth.
This book is a story of sacrifice, survival, curiosity, redemption, love, and, of course, science.
🏯 The Well of Ascension:
The Well of Ascension is the second book in the Mistborn trilogy, written by Brandon Sanderson. Unlike many fantasy novels, which end when the rebels (the good guys) overthrow the tyrant king and establish a fair kingdom, this book explores what happens after such an event. The main characters begin to notice problems with the world and realize it's not as balanced as it was when the Lord Ruler (the tyrant king) was alive. People are dropping dead, and ash is constantly falling from the sky, rendering lands useless for growing food.
The first half of the book focuses on the politics of fragile nations and power struggles between different leaders, as everyone tries to take the throne. The second half of the book contains an epic all-out war. The book ends with one of the best twists I've come across in any fantasy book.
🦁 Man's Search for Meaning:
I reread this amazing book every year or so. Viktor Frankl was a survivor of the Auschwitz concentration camp, so he had a close relationship with pain and suffering. This book is a mix of his biography and his theory of logotherapy.
In Viktor Frankl's theory, there are three ways to find meaning in life: 1) accomplishment, where one works hard and is rewarded for it (the reward does not have to be external); 2) love, where one loves someone completely; and 3) suffering, which must be for a just cause. If the suffering is not for a just cause, then one is in hell. The cause can be anything. For the prisoners in Auschwitz, it could be a memory of a loved one, a picture of a flower they wanted to see again, or the hope that the war would end one day. By choosing what they are willing to suffer for, they were able to extract meaning even in the face of unimaginable suffering.
