For various reasons, I think there is a close correspondence between your interests as a reader of this blog and these books which are suddently (and probably temporarily) cheap, in Kindle format, on Amazon. As you look through the (unordered) list, you’ll see what I mean.

Double Star by Robert Heinlein.

Hidden Figures Young Readers’ Edition by Margot Lee Shetterly. Since I’m not entirely sure what this edition is about (though it looks interesting) here is the description from Amazon:

This edition of Margot Lee Shetterly’s acclaimed book is perfect for young readers. It is the powerful story of four African-American female mathematicians at NASA who helped achieve some of the greatest moments in our space program. Now a major motion picture starring Taraji P. Henson, Octavia Spencer, Janelle Monae, Kirsten Dunst, and Kevin Costner.

Before John Glenn orbited the earth, or Neil Armstrong walked on the moon, a group of dedicated female mathematicians known as “human computers” used pencils, slide rules, and adding machines to calculate the numbers that would launch rockets, and astronauts, into space.

This book brings to life the stories of Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson, Katherine Johnson, and Christine Darden, who lived through the Civil Rights era, the Space Race, the Cold War, and the movement for gender equality, and whose work forever changed the face of NASA and the country.

In a Manner of Speaking: Phrases, Expressions, and Proverbs and How We Use and Misuse Them by Colin McNairn.

Flesh and Blood: A Scarpetta Novel (Kay Scarpetta Book 22) by Patricia Cornwell. (This is three back from the present in the series, number 21 from the start, I think).

Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error by Kathryn Schulz.

The Price of Altruism: George Price and the Search for the Origins of Kindness by Oren Harman. Since this may be a bit obscure, here’s the info on the book:

Survival of the fittest or survival of the nicest? Since the dawn of time man has contemplated the mystery of altruism, but it was Darwin who posed the question most starkly. From the selfless ant to the stinging bee to the man laying down his life for a stranger, evolution has yielded a goodness that in theory should never be.

Set against the sweeping tale of 150 years of scientific attempts to explain kindness, The Price of Altruism tells for the first time the moving story of the eccentric American genius George Price (1922–1975), as he strives to answer evolution’s greatest riddle. An original and penetrating picture of twentieth century thought, it is also a deeply personal journey. From the heights of the Manhattan Project to the inspired equation that explains altruism to the depths of homelessness and despair, Price’s life embodies the paradoxes of Darwin’s enigma. His tragic suicide in a squatter’s flat, among the vagabonds to whom he gave all his possessions, provides the ultimate contemplation on the possibility of genuine benevolence.

The Gods Themselves: A Novel by Asimov.

Conservatives Without Conscience by John Dean.

And, related to Dean’s book, Jailbird by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

Have you read the breakthrough novel of the year? When you are done with that, try:

In Search of Sungudogo by Greg Laden, now in Kindle or Paperback
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