Creekside Notes

There are books in my living room, in the study, near the dining table, on the counter in the bedroom where a TV set was supposed to be placed, and of course, right next to my bed. I enjoy reading fiction before going to sleep because it makes my dreams more interesting. Sometimes I alternate between different books in one night; at other times, I simply cannot put a book down until three o’clock in the morning. It’s hard to find a page-turner, at least for me. Three weeks ago, I read Kazuo Ishiguro’s THE REMAINS OF THE DAY for ten pages and went to bed. To this day, I still don’t feel like reopening it to find out what happened to Stevens. Well, Richard Osman’s THE THURSDAY MURDER CLUB seemed more appealing. I listened to it on the treadmill and during my commute. The story is engaging, but I don’t seem terribly eager to know how it develops. Don’t get me wrong: the murder has happened and the detectives are still scratching their heads trying to find the killer. Me too. But I’m not i...

Photo by the author: part of my home library in Taipei. As an avid reader, I have always wanted to know how to read better. Not faster for the sake of speed. Not more books for the sake of numbers. Better. I read across a strange but satisfying range of subjects. Right now, for example, I am reading the I Ching , The Seal of the Unity of the Three ( Cantong qi ), music theory, historical thrillers by Steve Berry, The Story of Mankind by Van Loon, Destiny Disrupted by Tamim Ansary, and whatever else catches my attention at the right moment. My home reflects that habit. There are books in the bedroom, books in the study, books in the living room, books in the dining area. Stacks on tables. Books beside the bed. Books waiting in corners like quiet companions. I live surrounded by them. And yet, for all that reading, there are still books I bought decades ago and never read, books I got halfway through, books of which I have read only a few pages, or books I skimmed once long ago. I kno...

  Photo by 🇸🇮 Janko Ferlič on Unsplash Have you ever looked back on your life and wondered how it might have unfolded differently if you had chosen another path? Perhaps you regretted not taking certain actions at particular moments? I did. Sometimes. The assumption is usually the same: if we had made a different choice, the rest would have become nice and smooth — better school, better relationship, better career, perhaps a bigger bank account and a bigger house. When we encounter unfavorable outcomes, we often fantasize about an alternate universe in which we made the “right” decision at a critical moment. After that, our lives would have been put on the right track, and we would have lived happily ever after. What if we had an unlimited number of options leading to an unlimited number of different lives? That is what The Midnight Library by Matt Haig wants to explore. A Library Between Lives Nora Seed has a miserable life. It seems that everything goes wrong — she gets laid ...