The post BOOK REVIEW: Pep Guardiola – The Evolution by Martí Perarnau appeared first on Confessions of a Readaholic.

Pages: 221, Kindle Edition

Published: 2016, Bloomsbury

Cover Rating: 5/5

Nominated for The Man Booker’s Prize in 2016, Hot Milk by Deborah Levy has been siting on my virtual shelf for over a year. I thought, before this year ends I should give it a go.

With an interesting cover, the plot revolves around Sofia, a twenty five year old anthropologist, born to a British mother and a Greek father. She believes she has spent much of her life trying to solve the mystery of her mother’s unexplainable illness. She is frustrated by her mother’s constant complains and travels with her to the coast of souther Spain to see a famous consultant in the hope that he might be able to cure her mother’s unpredictable limb paralysis. With doctor’s strange methods, Sofia track while tracking down her mother’s symptoms in an attempt to solve this msytery of her pain but along this journey that, she discovers her own desires, her sexual personality and coming on terms with herself.

The storyline starts flat but as it moves forward it becomes interesting and enjoyable. It might take some readers to adjust with the plot but let me tell you this is one of the books where plot is secondary. This I realised after I was done with almost half of the book. The characters are the mai point of this book. These characters are always thinking and feeling. They develop on their own, some of them instantly and are interesting personalities. Whenever the author shifts focus from our protagonist I observed how intelligent the other characters in ths novel are.

Moreover, one gets to see the transformation of some characters as the plot move forward. The writing style has a pace with it and I highly enjoyed the narrative. The writer has clearly captured the strangeness of a mother who demands attention from her child who is an adult. The element of this type complexity is explored through out the novel. The landscape described in the book is limited but I think it has high impact both on the readers of the book and the overall characterisation.

I enjoyed reading Deborah Levy’s work. She is now one of the those authors on my list that I have to explore and read their other published works. This book can be finished in a day as I managed to read. Something different, not your usual contemporary fiction.

4 out of 5

Buy this from Amazon

~ Find me on ~

BLOG |  GOODREADS |  TWITTER | FACEBOOK | MEDIUM

The post BOOK REVIEW: Hot Milk by Deborah Levy appeared first on Confessions of a Readaholic.

I have been quite busy with my reading schedule the previous book. I ended up reading three amazin books and will like to know which one you want me top post a review for next week?

A) Only Child by Rhiannon Navin (debut work, excellently written, genre Realism Fiction)

B) The Mask of Masculinity by Lewis Howes (genre: Nonfiction)

I think this one of the most important books I have read this year. Should included in school curriculums acroos the globe but that’s just my opinion.

5/5 from me on @lewishowes #themaskofmasculinity amazing content a #book IMO everyone should read to understand what is the true meaning of “the man”. #books #bookblogging #bookstagram #kindle #personaldevelopment #booklover #book

A post shared by Aman Mittal (@amanhimselfreads) on Feb 21, 2018 at 5:33am PST

C) The Legend of Kuldhara by Malathi Ramachandaran (genre: Historical Fiction)

Set in Rajasthan, India, is another one of my recent books. Very mature writing and an imaginative plot.

Recently finished #reading Malathi Ramachandran’s latest book. #bookstagram #recent #read #bookblogging #book #review coming soon.

A post shared by Aman Mittal (@amanhimselfreads) on Feb 19, 2018 at 4:40am PST

Let me know which one you think in the comments section below.

What did you read this week? Something spiked your interest? Feel free to recommend a book…

The post My Recent Reads Week #10-11 appeared first on Confessions of a Readaholic.

Origami Birds by Tanya Jain
Published by Notionpress on 13/09/2017
Genres: Fiction
Pages: 100
Format: eBook
Goodreads

The post BOOK REVIEW: Origami Birds by Tanya Jain appeared first on Confessions of a Readaholic.

The month of February has been super busy for me. At the start, I got involved in the launch of my ebook, A Blogger’s Manifesto (if you remember this post on the launch day). Of course, you do remember. I asked you guys to participate in helping me choose a book cover?

Nonetheless, just after launching my ebook, I started working on revamping this book blog (almost) from scratch and shifted its nitty-gritty to its own home with a link of its own. It is a time consuming, tedious work in transferring all the blog posts and then selecting a theme, finding the right plugins and organization in somewhat a new manner. You might be noticing a lot of changes here. The last of them have happened over the weekend, and I do not want to trouble you anymore with changing the UI.

Just want to drop a line about me being on Instagram as @amanhimselfreads. I will be sharing lots of content on books and motivate you to write more blog posts on your blog. If you are on Instagram, let us connect.

This post is me announcing that I am accepting books for review (as always) but there has been a slight change in Terms and Condition due to a lot of events that happened over the past weeks. If you want to send your book to review, you can contact me at my email: amandeepmittal@live but I urge you to read the following:

Book Review Updated Policy:

My reviews will consist of: 

• an honest and fair opinion
• Rates using the stars system (1 to 5 stars)
• will be more than a paragraph long
• My review will include the synopsis of the book
• My reviews will also be on Goodreads.com
• Will be occasionally shared on Social Media channels

Some T&Cs:

• I guarantee to post the review only on this blog
• If a review is deleted or removed by the administrator/authority on a site like Goodreads.com and Amazon, I am not liable in any way.
• The paid services are non-refundable and advance.
• I have complete rights to the reviews I write on for this book.
• The process of a review may take up to 30 to 60 days from the date I charge you for the service.
• I have complete right to select the date I want to post the review/interview/book spotlight.

I love reading books and writing about them on this blog but that does not mean anyone (as an admin or an authority) can come and make the task of blogging harder. If you agree to these terms, I will review your book. You can read more about the updated policies here.

Thank you.

Find me on Goodreads | Facebook | Medium | Twitter | Instagram

Check out my Ebook A Blogger’s Manifesto

The post Accepting Book for Reviews appeared first on Confessions of a Readaholic.

In my last post, I publicly announced that I am writing an ebook for bloggers and will be covering topics for book bloggers as my own niche. Those of you do not know me, I have been blogging for 5 years and I have learned a lot. This ebook is going to be a token of appreciation and my experiences I want to share with the people who are getting started in the blogosphere or are already a part of one.

Update on Ebook Writing

I am almost done with it. Going through a final draft and proofreading activities. I haven’t come up with a tentative date since I am new in the world of Self Publishing and I think it is a bit of a learning curve. More updates, in future posts or signup my Ebook Newsletter: http://eepurl.com/dh-c29

This time I need your help to choose me an ebook cover. I have spent last 8 days deciding which one and what colors and I have come up with four final options. Since this ebook I am writing is for you, the community, I thought why not let you decide which cover is the most suitable one.

These are four the options. Whichever cover gets the most vote will be cover of my next ebook. You are going to see this cover image on your Ereader, laptop, iBooks, smartphone, Amazon, etc. So vote wisely. To vote, go to the extreme below.

Option A

Option B

Option C

Option D

Before you vote, please note that these are final designs and only metadata such as a subtitle or author info will be added to the final cover.

Here is the poll, again, vote wisely.

Will update with Results on 28 Jan 12:00 PM.

You have Saturday, 27 Jan 11:59 PM to vote.

Thank you.

The post I need your help with my upcoming Ebook appeared first on Confessions of a Readaholic.

In 2017, I started my voracious reading journey with the word “productivity” in mind. In my workflow, I wanted to be as productive as I could but later realise that it has its limitations. First limitation that I come across as I continued on my path as I found that there is a vast field and there are sub-niches that fall under that word. I had to make a decision on how will I benefit more in terms of productivity itself but more importantly having/developing that mindset? I came across 28 books throughout the year. Few were recommendations from people who share similar goals as mine and few were picks of my own.

The post What to Read in 2018? A List of books worth your time appeared first on Confessions of a Readaholic.

Pages: 624, Kindle Edition

Published: 21st November 2017, by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Cover Rating: 5/5 (hint: something is in symmetry, see carefully)

I get excited when I hear Tim Ferriss is going to release a new book. The guy knows what to write, or at least how to present information in terms of mere words. Last year, I spent 18 days on his Tools of Titans which came out in the month of December. I haven’t spent more than 15 days on Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace and War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy. Tim’s books tend to cover a vast amount of information that is not easy for a human brain to process. After putting my nose in his other books such as The 4 Hour Work Week and The 4 Hour Body earlier this year, I had a plan.

Instead of spending a large amount of time and I spend only a significant amount of time to read his latest book which contains more than 100+ interviews of people around the world. I made my notes, did some highlights and will be referring back to it on need per basis. After all, I learnt this trick from Tim himself. In one of his many podcast episodes, The Tim Ferriss Show, he described, advice (or information/context) when comes to reading books will stick if it has to stick. In other words, when reading a book as heavy in material as Tim Ferriss’ last two (including the latest one), brain will be able to process most of the information but the only those thing will stay with you, or stick with your consciousness or occur at the moment when your subconscious is working for answers in an abstract moment. This is a great advice in the age of information overload.

All these mentors that Tim tracked down for this book were asked almost similar amount of questions with full willingness to answer or not to take in considertion the question they don’t want to answer. Some of these answers might help you in navigating your life further. Through short, action-packed profiles, Tim made these “mentors” share their secrets for success, happiness, meaning, and more. Book covers from questions across a variety of sectors, from tech entrepreneurs to actors, authors and sports stars. People like legendary investor Ray Dalio, Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz, Jimmy Fallon, Debbie Millman, Ethereum’s founder, Steven Pressfield, Yuval Noah Harari, Drew Houston, Neil Gaiman, Ashton Kutcher, Dita Von Teese, Marc Benioff, Evan Williams, Brandon Stanton, Esther Perel, Darren Aronofsky, Steve Aoki, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Maria Sharapova and other elite athletes like Kelly Slater, Tony Hawk… this list is long. You can may similarities or differences by reading the answers to this amount of people gave to fairly similar or exact questions they were asked by the author of the book. I am going to summarize few questions that I think were excellent to ask and a reader will certainly gain:

• Three or more Book recommendations
• An item purchased for $100 or less that has an impact in your life
• Favourite failure of yours or which failure had an impact for your later success
• A message you want to spread out
• Best or most worthwhile investment made in terms of money, time, energy etc.
• An unusual habit
• In last five years, a new belief, behaviour, or a habit developed or adapted

These are some of the questions that have a major impact on most interviews I found. Some of these answers will surprise you, as they did me. What more useful I find in this book is the art of questioning. In my recent years of working I have came to realise that only by asking better questions one will get better answers. Another one is that the most important thing is to ask. I do appreciate Tim’s effort on gathering and making contact with these individuals. (I know, some of them might be hard to contact. Not everyone knows Tim Ferriss, I think.)

This book contains a good amount of wisdom. What did not work for me is that a few interviewees weren’t necessary. I am not going to name them here. It is just a personal opinion, nothing to do with book and the effort made in making it. May be the pattern of Tools of Titans can be clearly seen here.

Nonetheless, I do recommend this book. It will be great addition for your winter reading list, also, holiday season is coming up. Lot’s of coffee (or tea, whatever hot beverage you prefer) and a copy of this book will make up for the season.

4 out of 5!

You can read my review of Tim’s last book Tools of Titans here. Do check out my book notes on Tools of Titans here.

You can buy Tribes of Mentors on Amazon.

~ Find me on ~

BLOG |  GOODREADS |  TWITTER | FACEBOOK

email: amandeepmittal@live.com

The post BOOK REVIEW: Tribe of Mentors – Short Life Advice from the Best in the World by Timothy Ferriss appeared first on Confessions of a Readaholic.

Lack of confidence is one of the reason why bloggers don’t publish their posts. Especially, in this age of information overload, we tend to gather much information without much effort about the needed topic or content interesting to us but due to lack of confidence your best post has never been published yet. We all struggle with the confidence at times when it comes to hitting the publish button. I have been blogging for more than four years and I battle the same force of struggle as you do, to feel confident. I have my doubt and worries similar to yours.

It’s a disease that wants you to stop writing. It wants you to stop researching, and gaining and sharing the knowledge with your readers. That is the definition of the “lack of confidence” in my mind.

However, you cannot lose in this battle of constant struggle. If you lose, means your blog is dead. Whether you are starting afresh, or blogging for a while, I’d advice you to continue on your journey. To win this battle is publish your next blog post out there and to do so you can begin by increasing your self-confidence now.

Take Action

Don’t just sit there thinking. Write that post. Write as many drafts as you can. Edit as many times you have to. Write it. Something that appears in your mind is same as being in the void. To make it an existing entity, in other words, to give it a life, you have to write that damn post!

Try something out of your comfort zone

Write or post about something that is non-related to or isn’t a part of your niche. Be creative. This will boost your confidence level and will amuse your audience. You might end getting learning something new and getting intrigue by the topic that it becomes a regular breakthrough in the queue of posts. Another advantage here is that it will give you time to prepare for your niche content.

Thinking You’re Ugly is Bad For You

Just as Meaghan Ramsay confronted a TED talk on the above headline about the body image that includes how we, as human beings, perceive our body image in our real lives, I want you to stop and notice your flow of thoughts whenever you are inspired by an idea or a topic or an experimentation you want to do on your blog. Don’t give too much attention to them. In fact, start to ignore them completely ASAP.

Focus on you what you are doing. You don’t what will happen in the future. You don’t how much feedback you are going t receive on your next blog post. To know all that, you have to give it a life of its own. Self-positive talk is the best piece of advice you or anyone can give to yourself. Train your mind to achieve the self-worthy belief and see the results.

For a reference you can Meaghan Ramsay’s TED talk here.

READ!

Reading is important for any writer or blogger. Read as much as you can. Feed your mind with the content that helps you raise your confidence level. It works. In the form of a book, I highly recommend “Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill”.

Also, take a look at these two bloggers:

• Darius Foroux
• Benjamin Hardy

They are great motivational writers and by sharing their own life experiences along with the intriguing tips on overcoming inner blocks and lack of confidence.

I highly recommend you start this article: How to train your brain to get what you really want

Keep Blogging!

~ Find me on ~

BLOG |  GOODREADS |  TWITTER | FACEBOOK

email: amandeepmittal@live.com

The post Boost Your Blogging Confidence and Write that Post appeared first on Confessions of a Readaholic.

Philip K. Dick’s Ubik is sci-fi, I generally do not read sci-fi, but being bored of other genres I guess it’s the time to pick this particular genre. The other two books are on football (soccer) and I’m counting on The Gaffer by Neil Warnock.

Any more recommendations are welcome, especially in the sci-fi genre!

The post New Reads appeared first on Confessions of a Readaholic.