Hunter Owens
@hunterowens
los angeles-area resident, your friendly state transportation policy bureaucrat, architecture, tacos.
51) CITY ON FIRE (Simon Elegant) - this is at least the second book with this title dealing with the subject matter (2019/2020 Hong Kong protests and the tragedy of the National Security Law) but this is the only detective fiction one, so I read this in a heartbeat and had fun
a really interesting through line through the @nickandert.bsky.social's work and his new opus on the "X" line is the importance and incentives of swapping value capture for capital investments while have a more stable source (ie, taxes) for operations www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1Ei...
absolutely insane statistic here from the LA Metro ZEB bus program team about European vs current New Flyer / RIDECo buses metro has in the fleet metro.legistar1.com/metro/attach...
garden tomato egg, garden Sichuan style long beans, black cod and tofu in a hunan style salted chili / black bean sauce
50) SHATTERED LANDS (Sam Dalrymple) - while this is an extremely nepo-child history book (Sam is the son of William, author of the Anarchy), this is one of the best books I've read this year, and a brilliant stitching together of the broader partitions of british india into a new narrative
49) GHOST-EYE (Amitav Ghosh) - a "fun" novel about reincarnation and climate doom, read this basically in entire delay at JFK on Saturday and had a very fun twist at the end an incredible food related plotline
48) NEW KINGS OF NEW YORK (Adam Piore) - very real estate tabloid reporting but a fun read about nyc between the 00s and 2020, but better books out there
47) WRONG WAY (Joanne McNell) - a very FSG novel about downward mobility, with a tech / self driving car twist. Didn’t love didn’t hate.
46) RURAL VS URBAN (Suzanne Mettler) - while not as good as her classic, the submerged state, a good review of how rural party dem collapse and R margins is driving dangerous polarization and the source of partisan divides, vs red state blue state
45) ASIAN GODFATHERS (Joe Studwell) - a much more entertaining but not as serious book as how asia works, very fun to look at this in the light of the AFC and how China overtook all the SE asia nations in growth and this book gives a history of why
44) EMPIRE OF AI (Karen Hao) - a little bit of three magazine features stapled together but a very good overview of openAI and got some great insider reporting from the Sam Altman firing and coup
43) THIS LAND IS YOUR LAND (Beverly Gage) - while it’s no G-MAN, this breezy road trip history book from Beverly Gage was fun for all the dads in your life (laudatory)
42) THE SCORE (C. Thi Nguyen) - really loved this book on the philosophy of games, but also, of metrics, and why and how we measure things. thought it was a good primer on some of issues and wrested with the philosophy in a unique way.
41) BORN IN FLAMES (Bench Ansfield) - this book was so great and comes to a vastly different conclusion that Joe Flood's THE FIRES, which the book is very much in dialogue with. a must read for students of the america city. The chapter on the origins of the FAIR plans is must read for policymakers
40) The Last Days of Budapest (Adam Lebor) - this was really frustrating, but the middle 3rd about spying and palace intrigue in 20s and 30s budapest was great. The stuff on loss the jewish community of budapest was heartbreaking but the book doesn't really deliver
39) LONDON FALLING (Patrick Radden Keefe) - a page turner for sure, maybe not as monumental as past works but it is insane that he manages to drop this and major NYer stories at the same time
smoked sausage, garden pistou, lentils with grilled leeks and tomatoes, grilled bread
38) HOLLOW SPACES ( Victor Suthammanont) - really great debut murder fiction with a very fun device used to setup the murder plot, discovery, and the finale.
37) LOST WORLDS ( @patrickwyman.bsky.social ) - really enjoyed this and was especially helpful as somebody's whose ancient history is dated - this was a really great book to bridge the divide between "humanity evolve" and "bronze age civilization" - and so much of the story is only new discoveries
bond yields rule everything around me journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....
chicken in a morel cream sauce, garden fava puree with first tomatoes of the season, sourdough
come work with me! we're hiring a transit data scientist to work directly on rail and transit issues Applications due 5/28, great benefits, even better coworkers, etc! calcareers.ca.gov/CalHrPublic/...