Bloody Inspiration Part III (My top 12 books for 2012)

One of the main benefits of being an independent publisher is that your reading takes on a whole new dimension. Every book you consume feeds your creativity; suggesting new ideas, new insights and new concepts.

I don’t know how many books, short stories and graphic novels I’ve read in the past year, but this list comprises the better material that has come across my Kindle. Unfortunately, I haven’t written reviews for all of them (I’ve been kind of busy) but I’ve provided a link for the ones I did. My tastes seem to focus on a particular subject this year. Can you tell what that could be?

1. Erotic Capital (non-fiction): This is an intriguing redefinition of personal motivation and gender relations that has changed the way I look at social dynamics. If you only read one book on this list, read this one.
2. Facing Violence (non-fiction): This is a well written treatise on avoiding and coping with violence that every martial artist, gun owner and self-defense enthusiast should read to calibrate their world view to reality. 
3. Why Women Have Sex (non-fiction) Using a combination of anonymous surveys, lab experiments and multi-discipline research, two psychologists attempt to answer the most complicated question of all time.
4. La Seduction: How the French Play the Game of Life (non-fiction): A case study of the seductive process on a national scale. It’s great for students of seduction and Francophiles alike.
5. Venus in Furs (erotic fiction): A classic BDSM romance that was an interesting introduction into the psyche of bottoms.
6. The Art of Intelligence (non-fiction): The author has a unique and authoritative view of espionage from the end of the Cold War to the beginning of the Iraq War and this is one of the better books on the subject that I have read.
7. The Art of Love (erotic fiction): A short and amusing version of the Art of Seduction that was written more than 2,000 years before Robert Greene was born.  It’s a nice historical look at the seductive process.
8. The Honourable Schoolboy (crime fiction): The follow up to the classic Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. It’s good, but not as engrossing as the first novel.
9. The Lost Diary of Don Juan (historic fiction) Douglas Abrams has added to the universal legend by imaging a character that is part spy, part seducer and part honey trap.
10. Henry and June (erotic fiction): Anias Nin’s autobiographical story of her polyamorous Parisian affair with Henry Miller is alluring and liberating, but it is also frustrating and incomplete. I think that was what she lived and what she wanted to describe.
11. The Khmer Kill: A Dox Short Story (crime fiction): One of my favorite author’s gave one of his supporting characters a little time in the limelight. The result was good, but it wasn’t as strong as his other short stories.
12. Simply Irresistible (non-fiction): This book takes one archetype in the Art of Seduction and expands it out into a full blown process of its own. It doesn’t pack the same punch as the original, even though it uses the same formula.
13. Exit to Eden (erotic fiction): It was supposed to be a modern classic in BDSM romance, but I probably cheated myself by listening to the abridged version.

So what were the best books you read for 2012?

What new trends and themes do you see when you look back on your year in reading?

Let me know with a comment.

Have fun.

G

Facing Violence: A Book Review

“War is a matter of vital importance to the state; a matter of life or death, the road either to survival or to ruin. Hence, it is imperative that it be studied thoroughly.” Sun Tzu: The Art of War 

Rory Miller takes the very first sentence in the Chinese military classic and expands upon it in lucid detail. Facing Violence draws readers into a world and a state of mind that most people in a civilized society imagine but do not really understand.

The title of the book suggests a guide about fighting, but that is misleading. Mr. Miller explores the entire continuum of close combat including:

• your personal beliefs and ethics
• the social and resourced based motivations of violent people
• to the legal criteria for self-defense
• the psychology of criminal violence
• your biological and physiological responses
• the mechanics of realistic combat
• the legal, social, and psychological aftermath of a violent encounter

Miller writes in a style that is simultaneously sobering, enlightening, depressing and insistent. It isn’t really a guide about how to react to potential violence. It is a well written treatise on avoiding and coping with violence that every martial artist, gun owner and self-defense enthusiast should read to calibrate their training to reality. 

As a writer, I read this book was to give a more realistic flavor to the characters and situations in my stories that dealt with concepts of violence. As a former, martial artist I highly recommend this book because it help people who have that kind of training adapt the lessons from the dojo into the real world.

Have fun.

Gamal