BookMattic

Dune Messiah is getting a movie adaptation! Dune: Part 3! Anyone else is excited as I am for this?

I've read the first book, Dune Messiah, and Children of Dune but stopped after that just to kind of give myself a break. Frank Herbert's writing style is not necessarily my cup of tea but I honestly love the philosophical messages he mixes in his storyline saying character development.

And I'm so glad that Denis Villeneuve is still the director of this one, and whoever chose the cast for Aalia hit it spot on and a happy that Anya Taylor-Joy is taking that position. I know she's going to rock it!

For those of you that are mainly nonfiction book readers out there, I highly suggest at least trying to read the first book of Dune because you will be surprised at its depth and real world issues we face in real life.

These books are a gem worth learning from.

From the East Coast to the West Coast—finally got to meet up in person with my friend

We’ve known each other since around 2018 or 2019 through the book community online, and over the years we’ve had some great conversations through video calls and comments.

Funny how that works… you talk to someone for years, and then one day you’re just standing there like, “oh, you’re a real person.”

Really glad we made it happen while he was visiting Portland. Good conversations, good energy, and a solid reminder that some online connections are actually worth bringing into real life.

Looking forward to the next one.

I used to work at Blockbuster.

Five free rentals a week.
Endless movie debates.
Blue polo. Peak culture.

I remember spending entire shifts talking about movies. Why they worked. Why they failed. Why a character’s decision felt right or completely irrational.

Stories have shaped how I think about leadership, growth, and learning.

One things that I always have believed about stories, which is one of the reasons why I became an educator, is that stories are part of learning.

Every story is a rehearsal for life.

When we watch characters make decisions, fail, grow, sacrifice, or self-sabotage, our brains simulate those experiences. We practice courage and perspective. Stories are compressed life lessons.

To this day, I do not just watch a movie or read a book passively. I analyze motivations, trade-offs, and belief systems.

Blockbuster may be gone but the learning remains.
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Question: What was one of your favorite jobs when you were first starting your career?
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P.S. This was not taken at an actual Blockbuster. It was taken at in Vancouver Washington!

I'm reading Unhinged Habits by Jonathan Goodman, and there is already one takeaway that genuinely moved me and it's this:

It feels true that the less we explore, the more our mind stagnates.

However, exploration does not just mean exploring our external world. it means that we should explore both internal and external because if we are just thinking, reflecting, or trying to understand ourselves it does not mean we can stay cooped up inside our house, alone.

We need to be outside.
We need nature.
We need other people.

The more you explore, the more fulfilling your life becomes.

This really resonated with me because, over the past few months, I have not been going out much at all. Part of that has been winter. I know from experience that when I get out more and truly explore, I become happier and feel more connected. I start to feel like I'm actually part of the community again instead of watching life from the sidelines.

What makes this even more important is how much it connects to identity.

I'm not in the same environment I was in last year. Because of that, I cannot expect to be the same person I was before.

I cannot adapt the environment to me. I have to adapt to it. I have to explore it, engage with it, and allow it to shape who I am becoming.

Not who I used to be.
Not who I wish I were.
But who I am NOW.

If this book only gives me this one lesson, I already know it will have been worth reading.

Thank you, This arrived at exactly the right moment.

2nd Book of 2026 Frank Herbert's Children of Dune. Have you read it?

I finished Children of Dune, and I’m left less impressed by the spectacle and more unsettled by the ideas underneath it.

Compared to the first book’s myth-making and the second book’s dismantling of the “chosen hero,” this one feels like a warning label. Power, especially when paired with certainty, doesn’t just corrupt individuals. It reshapes systems, cultures, and futures in ways that can’t be easily undone.

Paul’s children inherit more than abilities. They inherit consequences. Leto’s decision to embrace the “Golden Path” is framed as sacrifice, but it’s also a reminder that some solutions demand control so extreme that freedom disappears for generations. His reign isn’t about ruling well. It’s about locking humanity onto a single path and forcing it to stay there for thousands of years.

That’s where the book started feeling familiar.

In real life, we often praise ambition, disruption, and long-term vision without asking who pays the cost or how long the damage lasts. Whether it’s leadership, business, environmental decisions, or personal choices, short-term certainty can create long-term fragility. By the time the consequences show up, reversing course may be impossible.

Dune’s slow death is especially telling. Terraforming was done with good intentions. It still broke the ecosystem. Once the system changed, there was no clean undo button. Only adaptation, sacrifice, and time measured in centuries.

My biggest takeaway wasn’t about heroes or villains. It was this:

1. Power without humility scales mistakes.

2. Vision without restraint hardens into tyranny.

3. And some problems, once created, outlive everyone who caused them.

That’s a heavy lesson for a novel, but probably the right one.

1st Book of 2026 Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis is often remembered for its grotesque premise, a man waking up as an insect. That’s unfortunate, because the transformation itself is the least interesting thing in the story. Kafka’s real concern is not what Gregor Samsa becomes, but how everyone else responds once he can no longer be useful. In Part II of the novella, Kafka exposes a brutal social logic: human worth is conditional, sustained only as long as one remains economically and functionally valuable.

What makes Kafka’s critique especially disturbing is that it unfolds not through villainy or melodrama, but through ordinary family behavior. The Samsa household does not suddenly turn cruel. Instead, affection quietly erodes into management, care hardens into control, and responsibility decays into resentment. The horror of The Metamorphosis lies in how reasonable this process appears.

One of Kafka’s most effective techniques is the family’s shifting language toward Gregor. Early references to him as a son and brother dissolve into impersonal labels. Grete’s refusal to use Gregor’s name, declaring that “we must try to get rid of it,” marks a decisive linguistic break. By replacing “brother” with “monster” and “it,” Grete does more than express fear. She reclassifies Gregor’s identity. Kinship, Kafka suggests, was never unconditional. It was contingent on productivity.

This erosion of humanity is reinforced through spatial symbolism, particularly Gregor’s room. Once a private space of rest, it becomes a site of confinement and exclusion. Doors are no longer thresholds of connection but mechanisms of control. When Grete locks Gregor inside after feeding him, the narrator frames the act as delicate consideration. Yet the locked door functions symbolically as a boundary between human and non-human, belonging and disposal. Kafka’s irony is surgical. What is presented as kindness is, in effect, quarantine.

Perhaps most unsettling is Kafka’s use of narrative distance. The narrator’s calm, procedural tone drains moments of cruelty of any emotional spectacle. Gregor’s food is removed with a rag His presence is managed silently.

Top 5 Books of 2025: Perfect New Year’s gifts for people who want less noise and more direction.

Rise of the Reader by reminded me why I started reading personal development books in the first place. It’s not about how many books you read. It’s about reading with intention and actually doing something with what you learn. This book helped me reconnect with daily reading as a habit and, more importantly, as a catalyst for real action and growth.

Co-Intelligence shook me awake to just how fast AI is reshaping not only industries, but what it means to be intelligent, creative, and human. Ethan Mollick argues that working with AI is no longer optional. It’s a literacy. This book didn’t give me predictions. It gave me frameworks for collaborating with AI as a thinking partner, tool, and amplifier of our best work.

What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami offered a quiet but powerful meditation on movement, discipline, and identity. Murakami blends memoir, philosophy, and marathon training into something deeply human. It made me reflect on how solitary effort shapes who we become, not just in running, but in writing, working, and living.

Grit and Wit by Kathy Delaney-Smith reminded me that the best leadership isn’t about titles or talent. It’s about preparing people for life. Kathy Delaney-Smith’s mix of toughness, empathy, and consistency reshaped how I think about teaching, parenting, and leading through transitions. This book didn’t just inspire me. It challenged me to actually ACT AS IF and live the lessons every day.

Artificial Death of a Career David Oxley and Helmut Schuster at exactly the right moment. Through Shey Sinope’s rise, drift, and forced reinvention, it put language to something I was already feeling. Careers don’t collapse suddenly. They quietly lose purpose. This book reminded me that staying relevant isn’t about hustling harder. It’s about staying awake, reflective, and willing to realign before drift turns into decay

If you’re giving books this New Year, give ones that don’t just inform.

Give ones that move people.

Careers rarely collapse in flames.
They fade and disappear into oblivion.

That’s what Artificial Death of a Career by gets so disturbingly right.

Shey Sinope doesn’t fail because he lacks talent. He fails because he stops examining why he’s doing the work. The drift looks like success. It feels like momentum. Until the system he built decides he’s no longer needed.

Reading this while navigating my own transition hit harder than expected. After 14 years building a life and career abroad, I came back to the U.S., switched paths, and it’s been quite the trip. The structure disappeared. The certainty vanished. What remained was noise in my head.

The book’s power isn’t just the ideas. It’s how they sneak up on you.

CAFFEINE isn’t about blowing up your life. It’s about staying awake long enough to notice you’re drifting.
TICK isn’t about toughness as bravado. It’s about moving anyway when clarity hasn’t arrived yet.

What pulled me forward wasn’t confidence. It was action. Reading a few pages. Writing things down. Reconnecting with the idea that progress creates meaning, not the other way around.

This book isn’t anti-tech or anti-ambition.
It’s anti-autopilot.

Careers don’t die because people stop working.
They die because people stop examining why they’re working.

Are you still awake in your own life?

I’m rereading Man’s Search for Meaning for the third time, and honestly, it hits harder during seasons of transition.

When life feels uncertain, noisy, or stripped down to the essentials, this book has a way of cutting through everything.

Viktor E. Frankl endured an unimaginable level of suffering, yet still found a way to articulate peace, purpose, and responsibility in the face of it. That contrast never stops humbling me. His pain wasn’t abstract. It was lived. And somehow, he turned it into something that continues to help millions of people steady themselves.

If you’re in a moment of change…

If you’re questioning direction, meaning, or identity…

If you’re just trying to find some quiet clarity in the chaos…

This book doesn’t give you easy answers. It gives you something better: perspective.

I genuinely believe it’s one of the most important books ever written. And yes, it’s worth rereading.