Why We Sleep

First of all, a huge thank you to my friend Chris for giving this book to me as my birthday present! I think part of the reason why Chris might have given me this book is that I once told him that I wake up at 4:00 a.m. to exercise, and he wanted me to know how important sleep was. For some reason I feel like I have always known, at least through folklore, that sleep is important, but I am glad to have learnt more about the scientific reasons behind this belief, and more about sleep and dreams, in general.

  Yes, I highly recommend reading this book to anyone because I do believe that having a better sleep will dramatically improve our health, and will make us have a better life, in all aspects. Of course, as very well pointed out by the author himself: "Just as describing the scientific dangers of how eating junk food leads to obesity rarely ends up with people choosing broccoli over a cookie, knowledge alone is not enough" (Walker, M. Why We Sleep. p. 329. United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland: Penguin Books, 2018).

  Indeed changing one's habits can be incredibly difficult. Fortunately for me, I think I have been trying much more consciously to change some of my habits, and I think it has gone well so far! I would like to believe that this book has helped me improve the quality of my sleep, and I think it can help many other people too.

  Despite my favourable opinion of this book, I must say I am still a bit skeptical about some of the results of the experiments that are described in the book. The results almost always seem to adhere very closely to the author's conjectures, and I wished I could see more of the statistical analyses that were done, as currently one might think that they might be too good to be true.

His Dark Materials

A very long time ago my father gave me the first book of this trilogy, in Spanish. I remember reading the first page and dedicing that it was too boring for me. Indeed I did not read the book for many, many years; certainly more than 15 years. But then there were several independent instances through the years where I heard people expressing high praise for these books. Finally, when Aidan told me he really liked the universe of these books, I made the executive decision of buying all of them in one volume and read them.

  I am happy that I made that decision, as the narrative is entertaining and the books are well-written. Without knowing anything about Phillip Pullman, I knew just by reading the book that it had to had been written by an English author since the writing is characteristically polite and elegant. Which made the scenes of violence surprising in a way that I had not read before. And I think the writing alone is the reason I would recommend reading His Dark Materials.

  The rest of the book —the universe that Pullman created, and the storyline— is pretty much just the excuse Pullman had to show to the world how beautiful his writing is. In fact, the rest of the book is standardly simple. Though I do appreciate that the author offers young readers an introduction to the debate on right and wrong, and to humanity's fraught relationship with Christianity.

  I am left with mixed feelings. Though, I think Michael Torpey would be of the opinion that if a book makes you think about things, and makes you feel feelings, then it is probably a good book.