Book Review: i, Geek - Confessions of a Geeky Mind
"So, to come to my core point: don’t limit yourself. Explore, try new things. Open yourself up to things that are outside your comfort zone. Learn. Live. And love more than just one genre or show."
I read through this book pretty quickly after it was recommended while doing a recent episode of my podcast. It was a book I hadn't heard of before and seemed interesting enough to me (especially since it is available for cheap on Amazon Kindle). The author, Joseph Dickerson, collects blog posts of his from around the Internets and curates them in this book under a few general categories like technology, design, Star Trek, and some others.
The book is a under 200 pages and I'll admit, even with it being very short, I skipped over some of his posts about user interface design, as it wasn't relevant to me at all. It is his day job and I know I like to talk about higher education so I can understand why he put it in there, it just feels out of place. I really enjoyed what he wrote about Star Trek (which is a lot of this book), since it feels a lot like what I have written and feel about the show and what makes it great. Frankly, the whole book feels like something I've been thinking of writing for a while now; simply a collection of my best blog posts curated around common topics.
Much like I have, Dickerson writes about the life lessons learned from a geeky life, and how we can all gleam some morsels of wisdom from video games, books, movies, and television. The above quotes is one of my favorites from the book. We could all use some time out of the ordinary, even if it is taking a chance on a new story (in whatever medium you prefer). I know I've found some awesome things by just taking a leap on something that just feels right.
Especially for the low price on Kindle, I recommend this book for a leisurely read on a weekend with a nice cup of coffee/tea. It has some worthwhile portions and I'm sure others will find certain sections more enticing than I did.