How to read 200 books a year!

At the beginning of the year I challenged myself to read 200 books a year. I have so far read about 137 books. The strategy I adopted involved building a reading habit on my commute to and from work. I spend about 3 to 4 hours daily commuting. So instead of listening to radio I listed to audio books. I have invested in a number of speed reading apps and audio book apps. I usually arrive at work at 6.30am so I use the time from 6.30am to 8.00am to catch up on my reading. The lock down also helped to free up some time to learning. The main reason for pursuing this challenge was to test my intellectual limits. I guess it’s the same reason people climb mountains and bike across continents. Plus I needed fresh ideas and tips to share with the Money Engineer audience. Most of the articles and content I have shared with you have been inspired by these books. And of course reading is a super power in the information age. All the solutions to life’s problems and challenges are hidden in books.

Here is the current list of books I have read so far. I have 63 books to reach my target. Hopefully everything goes according to plan and I am able to reach my target.

1. How to win friends and influence people – Dale Carnergie
2. Grit – Angella Duckworth
3. 33 strategies of war – Robert Greene
4. Elon Musk – Ashlee Vance
5. Business adventures – 12 classic tales from Wall Street – John Brooks
6. The black swarn – Nassim Nicholas Taleb
7. The leader who had no title – Robin Sharma
8. Quiet – power of introverts – Susan Cain
9. Influence – psychology of persuasion – Dr. Robert Cialdini
10. earn it and enjoy it – linda proctor
11. Decisive – Chip and Dan Heath
12. Built to last – Successful Habits of Visionary Companies – Jim Collins and Jerry I. Porras
13. 21 lessons for the 21st century – Yuval Noah Harari
14. 7 strategies for wealth and happiness – Jim Rohn
15. A brief history of thought – Luc Ferry
16. A guide to the good life – William B. Irvine
17. An economist walks into a brothel – Allison Schrager
18. Beyond measure – Margaret Heffernan
19. Business for Bohemians – Tom Hodgkinson
20. Charlie Munger – Tren Griffin
21. Creative schools – Ken Robinson and Lou Aronica
22. Creativity – Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
23. Deep thinking – Gary Kasparov
24. Deviate – Beau Lotto
25. Do design – Alan Moore
26. Dollars and Sense – Dan Ariely and Jeff Kreisler
27. Double Double – Cameron Herold
28. Doughnut economics – Kate Raworth
29. Eat that frog – Brian Tracy
30. Eight dates – John Gottman and Schwartz Gottman
31. Elevate – Joseph Deitch
32. Entreleadership – Dave Ramsey
33. Everyday millionaires – Chris Hogan
34. Evil geniuses – Kurt Andersen
35. First things first – Stephen Covey
36. Future shaper – Niamh O’keeffe
37. Getting things done – David Allen
38. Got your attention – Sam Horn
39. Great thinkers – Alain de Botton
40. Help me – Marianne Power
41. How to be an adult in relationships – David Richo
42. How to do nothing – Jenny Odell
43. How to fly a horse – Kevin Ashton
44. How to have a happy hustle – Bec Evans
45. How to lead smart people – Arun Singh + Mike Mister
46. How to live a good life – Massimo Pigliucci
47. How to love – Thich Nhat Hanh
48. How to speak machine – John Maeda
49. If you’re so smart, why aren’t you happy? – Raj Raghunathan
50. Ingenius – Tina Seelig
51. Intimacy and Desire – Dr. David Schnarch
52. Leaders eat last – Simon Sinek
53. Limitless – Jim Kwik
54. Lost and Founder – Rand Fishkin
55. Love sense – Sue Johnson
56. Made to stick – Chip and Dan Heath
57. Making ideas happen – Scott Belsky
58. Maps of meaning – Jordan B. Peterson
59. Millionaire success habits – Dean Graziosi
60. Napoleon Hill’s golden rules – Napoleon Hill
61. On the shortness of life – Seneca
62. On writing well – William Zinsser
63. Originals – Adam Grant
64. Outsmarting the crowd – Napoleon Hill
65. Pitch perfect – Bill McGowan and Alisa Bowman
66. Ready for anything – David Allen
67. Sapiens – Yuval Noah Harari
68. Solve for happy – Mo Gawdat
69. Stillness is the key – Ryan Holiday
70. Super Attractor – Gabrielle Bernstein
71. Super Thinking – Gabriele Weinberg
72. Superhuman innovation – Chris Duffey
73. Surrounded by idiots – Thoman Erikson
74. Talking across the divide – Justin Lee
75. Talking to strangers – Malcolm Gladwell
76. The 7 habits of highly effective people – Stephen Covey
77. The barefoot investor – Scott Pape
78. The behavior gap – Carl Richards
79. The case against education – Bryan Caplan
80. The creative thinking handbook – Chris Griffiths + Melina Costi
81. The creativity Code – Marcus du Sautoy
82. The execution factor – Kim Perell
83. The game – Neil Strauss
84. The geometry of wealth – Brian Portnoy
85. The great mental models – Shane Parrish, Rhiannon Beaubien
86. The hard thing about hard things – Ben Horowitz
87. The hidden Brain – Shankar Vedantam
88. The joy of less – Francine Jay
89. The laws of wealth – Daniel Crosby
90. The man who solved the market – Gregory Zuckerman
91. The mindful day – Laurie J. Cameron
92. The moment of lift – Melinda Gates
93. The myths of innovation – Scott Berkun
94. The power of broke – Daymond John with daniel Paisner
95. The quiet mind – John E. Coleman
96. The science of story telling – Will Storr
97. The success principles – Jack Canfield
98. The upside of irrationality – Dan Ariely
99. The way of Zen – Alan W. Watts
100. The wisdom of finance – Mihir A. Desai
101. The wisdom of insecurity – Alan Watts
102. Think like a rocket scientist – Ozan Varol
103. Thou shall prosper – Daniel Lapin
104. Ultra learning – Scott H. Young
105. Unlearn – Barry O’reilly
106. Unleashing the idea virus – Seth Godin
107. Unlocking Creativity – Michael Roberto
108. Unshakeable – Tony Robbins
109. Warren Buffet’s Ground rules – Jeremy C. Miller
110. What I learned losing a million dollars – Jim Paul, Brendan Moynihan
111. When genius failed – Roger Lowenstein
112. Why are we yelling – Buster Benson
113. Take charge of your money – John Ntende
114. Double your money – Aga Sekalala Snr
115. Titan – The life of John D Rockefeller – Ron Chernow
116. Happy Money – The Japanese Art of Making Peace with Your Money – Ken Honda
117. Think like a monk – Jay Shetty
118. The game of life and how to play it – Florence Scovel
119. The psychology of self esteem – Nathaniel Branden
120. The art of communicating – Thich Nhat Hanh
121. Neuropsychology of self discipline – Steve DeVore and Dr. Karl Pribram
122. The art of money getting – P.T. Barnum
123. Henry Ford – a life – Editors of new world city
124. Ronald Regan a life – Editors of new world city
125. Poor Charlie’s Almanach – Warren Buffet
126. The last lecture – Randy Pausch
127. Vagabonding – Rolf Potts
128. Writing down the bones – Natalie Goldberg
129. Alex Ferguson – My biography – Alex ferguson
130. The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing – Al Ries and Jack Trout
131. The enchiridion – Epictetus
132. Maximising your potential – Dr. Myles Munroe
133. This is marketing – Seth Godin
134. Debt proof your marriage – Mary Hunt
135. Ikigai: The Japanese Secret to a Long and Happy Life – Héctor García & Francesc Miralles
136. You’re a badass – Jen Sincero
137. Clean – James Hamblin