Books

Day 12: Dispatches 

A semi-cohesive collection of spectacular gonzo flavored Vietnam War semi-journalism. 

Chaotic neutral on the war book alignment chart. The author worked on the scripts for Apocalypse Now and Full Metal Jacket and this book has a lot of that energy. 

It also created lot of the vibe and a lot of the tropes that show up consistently in other Vietnam War movies. 

It’s heavy on absurdity and you constantly feel like anything could happen, but it never gets too disorienting. If you read it in a single sitting, you’d spend the next week talking like Dennis Hopper’s character from Apocalypse Now. 

Five stars. Definitive work

Day 13: Kitchen Confidential

An absolute treasure. I listened to the audiobook this time, read by Bourdain himself, which I strongly recommend.

It popped out of that magical overlap of eras where the artist’s craft has fully matured but the artist’s pathos has not yet been quenched by the validation of great acclaim.

In other words, it’s a masterfully written book with the energy and intensity of youth. He more or less disowned it in his later years, but there’s a good reason why it outperforms his later, more sophisticated, more emotionally mature work.

It works as a coming of age memoir, as industry gossip, as food writing, as travel writing, etc. he could have written about tech, history, interest rates, whatever and I still would have gobbled it up.

If you liked his shows but haven’t read it, it’s mandatory reading. If you just like good writing or eating at restaurants, it’s mandatory reading. It’s mandatory reading.

Five stars.

I recommend his Medium Raw to help with the comedown.

✅ 11 tipped ∙ 10 remaining

31 / 41 (76%)
🟧🟧🟧🟧🟧🟧🟧🟧⬜⬜

Actually nothing to mention. But some curiousity about new thechnologies.