10 Insightful Nonfiction Books to Make You Smarter

As much as fiction can be entertaining and self-reflective, I find that nonfiction is just as important in developing our mindset and knowledge. Yet, just like fiction, there are all kinds of nonfiction to choose from—it has as many genres as fictions, actually. Personally, my favourites are those with cold, hard facts in it—anything scientific, historical or cultural. I mean, I wouldn't knock a good self-help or a memoir or biography, but as far as keeping my mind sharp and widening my horizon, I often would need to turn to numerical and hard-proven data. And, honestly, books that have evidently been thoroughly researched taught me many new things about and changed the way I see the world. It has opened my eyes to how little I know about this realm I live in. So I thought today I'd share some of the insightful nonfiction books I've read before that will surely enrich your knowledge and knock your horizon wide open. Enjoy!

The 8th Wonder

10 Asian Books & Films You Might Have Missed

Happy Friday the 13th, all! Today I want to start a brand new series—if you could call it that—where I will recommend books and films from all the continents—excluding Antarctica, 'cause as far as I know, nobody publishes from there. I think I'd call this #LiteraturebyContinent, although I wouldn't include it in the title, as it won't fit. Basically, in each post, I will introduce you to 5 books and 5 films from each continent. I will try my best to find really good hidden gems and offer titles you might never have heard of before. And, of course, as we know, each continent tends to contain quite a number of countries and nations within it—excluding Australia, I suppose—so I'll try to offer diversity on that front as well. Seeing as I come from and live in Asia, I thought I would start with the largest continent on earth, with a wide variety of complex cultures and peoples. Let me just give a disclaimer here: even though I am Asian and I do still reside in Asia, I am in no way an expert on Asia. I haven't read all the books and watched all the films from all corners of the continent, so do forgive me if I may repeat recommendations from the same country and/or region. That being said, I hope these underrated titles will pique your interest.

Airing Out Grievances

TBR: Midyear Never-Forget Pile

Uh-oh, guys, I've got a real problem here: I've gone crazy with the book purchasing for the first half of the year! 😱 My TBR pile is stocking up, yet I couldn't keep my eyes and hands off books at bookstores—used and new. Today I thought I'd pile up books that I haven't flip through yet, so I'll remember exactly how many books are waiting for me at home. These are books I bought recently—I've gone on a crazy binge, y'all!—and one from last year. But they exclude the ones from this post—a few of which I have yet to touch as well. Although there's no theme to the books I pick, most of these books have been sitting on my TBR for years, and I'm glad to be able to finally find them—secondhand too! Without further ado, here are the books in my TBR for the rest of the year.

Déjà vu

This Time Last Year

10 Books + Films with Diverse Muslim Representations

Wow, time sure does fly, huh? I swear Ramadan just started yesterday, yet now Eid is already upon us. How are you this past month? For me, Ramadan is always a good time for reflecting and learning more about being a Muslim. The world has been changing a lot lately, and people are more aware of the diversity all around us—whether in terms of gender, race or faith. It has opened up so many doors for people of varying backgrounds to speak up and tell their stories, including Muslim women. Recently, I just realised that Muslim representation in literature and media has been pretty narrow—usually almost always Middle Eastern, either rejecting the religion or adopting extremist views—but real Muslims have found platforms for them to voice their own perspectives. The other day I found this video by a Muslim American content creator and it pulled down a rabbit hole of Muslim content creators from around the world, especially Black ones. It inspired me to really dig deep into the media I consume and how they portray Muslims—especially Muslim women—and I'd like to share some good ones with you all.

Ready to Join a Convent

HAUL: First Loots from 2021

 

When 2021 started, I made a vow to myself that I wouldn't buy another book until I finish all the books waiting for me at home. Of course—as all book lovers could probably guess—that promise was broken almost straight away. Already in January I bought 4 books, followed by 1 book in February and 3 books in March. Go figure! I'm happy to announce, though, that out of those newly-purchased books, a total of 3 books have been read, finished and reviewed—check it out on my Goodreads, if it tickles your fancy! So, at least, that means I bought books I knew I would read and—possibly even—enjoy. That being said, the number of TBRs on my table is still piling on. These are the titles I've never shown or mentioned before, as well as those I've only recently purchased. I'm super happy that most of these were bought secondhand, which means less waste in the world. Without further ado, here are the books I've acquired recently.

Sagaleh Sajo Daulu

What I've Been Reading Lately (Other than Books)

If you know me at all or have been following this blog for a few years, you may notice that books are a huge part of my everyday life. I would read a book every chance I get. They help me relax, they wake me up, they widen my horizon and they keep me entertained. In fact, just three weeks ago I posted my Top 10 Books of 2020. However, books aren't the only things I enjoy reading. There are numerous publications—both online and offline—that will give me the same satisfaction as reading books. They give me knowledge, perspective and can often be enjoyed in smaller pieces. I love to read them in between tasks or during commute or, even, when I'm in the loo. Small bursts of inspiration, you know. They also aren't included in Goodreads database—with good reason. Here are a few such publications that I've enjoyed flipping or scrolling through lately.

The Best Books I Read in 2020

I think we can all agree that 2020 wasn't particularly easy. For me, personally though, this year rocked—mostly because I got through hurdles I didn't expect to overcome. This year I had to do my thesis project, which was pretty time- and energy-consuming, so I was quite doubtful I could reach my reading goals at all. However, it turns out, that the project has actually allowed me to venture into topics I had never explored before—and ended up giving me time to read more books in the process. Since last year, I had vowed to myself to focus more on quality than quantity, in terms of reading—last year fell short somewhat, in my opinion, but this year was incredible. For starters, there is no book lower than 3 stars for me this year—and it started off with 5-star exemplars. Both for fictions and non-fictions, I'm so satisfied with my choices this year..and I'd love to share the best ones with you. Please read on to find out these worthy-of-a-flip-through titles.

TBR: The End-of-Year Pile

Lately, I have been completely and utterly hooked on used book stores on Instagram. After discovering a bunch in the past couple months, I find myself unable to stop purchasing from them. In total, I've bought 9 books by this means—and I still want more! It's been good to go low-waste on my book purchases, cutting down on my carbon footprints and supporting local businesses. That being said, the books have definitely piled up and taken up quite an amount of space in my room. I thought, to remind myself, I'd put the books here, so they can no longer be ignored—in the hopes that you guys will hold me accountable to reading them. Of course, if you feel the need for book inspirations, feel free to note down some of the titles in this post to add to your own TBR.

Learning to Truly Eat Local

A few months ago, I stumbled upon this book online—on sale; it's about sorghum. Having seen sorghum in a local bulk store in the past, I was instantly intrigued. At the time, I didn't know what sorghum was and what role it plays in the food distribution in this country. Needless to say, I purchased the book. Thus began my journey down the rabbit hole that is food crisis. Did you know that we have a global food crisis and it is not caused by the shortage of food being produced? Yes, major food wastage also plays a role, but that's not the only one. The number one cause is, actually, food uniformity. We humans used to rely on 30,000 species of plants for food and medicine—now we only largely rely on 30. Sixty percent of our diet, in fact, is made up of only 3 annual crops—rice, wheat and corn (Source: Green Dreamer). It may not seem like much, but before you know it, children are suffering from malnutritions and farmers are planting the wrong kind of crops. This is something that I'm starting to learn recently—and what that looks like in Indonesia. Feel free to read more if you're as intrigued as I am.

Satu Merdeka, Semua Merdeka

HAUL: Gramedia Online Book Sale

Last week the biggest bookstore chain in Indonesia, Gramedia, hosted an online book sale on their website. I'd never bought anything from them online before, but the 20-50% offer got me hooked. With barely any expectations at all, I checked out what they had in store. It thrilled me to find so many amazing titles—some of which I'd been dying to own for so long—and incredible book covers in the store. The Indonesian book industry is certainly thriving and I'm very excited to dive deep into these local books again. Long story short, I ended buying quite a few books from this site and today a couple of them have been thoroughly read. Without further ado, here's what I've got.

When Will We Start Believing the Scientists?

Recently, I've been reading a couple books about the environment. Ironically, as someone who aspires to do right by nature, I haven't actually read a lot of books on the matter. Don't get me wrong—I've read numerous articles and watched countless videos as well as a few documentaries, but, for some reason, not many books. There have been a few environmental fiction—or cli-fi (climate fiction) as some people choose to describe it. However, somehow I found myself with some new books on the environment and it's the kind that gets deep and rough with all the excruciatingly detailed data. As a girl who believes in numbers, these data excite me. Finally, I could start learning about the truth behind environmental sciences—but, boy, was I not ready for reality.

#StayatHome: 10 Books to Flip Through on Goodreads

Woohoo! It's been three weeks of self-quarantine for me, how about you? I hope by now you've been keeping yourself entertained and sane one way or another. If you've run out of ideas of what to do, you can check out the Netflix and Spotify recommendations I've got posted this past two weeks. Today I am back with more recommendations—this time it's books! Clearly, I was saving the best for last. If you follow me on Goodreads, these are all books in my Most Beloved Read list—meaning they all got five stars from me and more. Some of them you have heard of before—either from me or from everyone else—and some you may find completely unfamiliar, but you've got my guarantee that these are all worth your while. Without further ado, here are some of the books I believe you should read before you die of boredom.

2019: My Year in Books

There are only 3 days left before we have to transition to 2020. Can you believe 2019 is ending soon?! Personally, I find it really quite surreal—especially since this year has thrown me a complete curve ball. It is truly my most extroverted year yet—so much so that I barely had time to read at all. Thankfully, earlier this year I also made a commitment to myself to read more quality and less quantity—and I've been able to keep to it. In comparison to my goal of 50 books last year—which I smashed with 60 books read—I decided to cut down and only strive for 30 books this year. Even so, that goal was an uphill battle for me—but I did it. So here are some of those books, divided into top 5 and bottom 5—just so I won't keep you for too long. These are, of course, in the order of best ones and worst ones first.