My top six picks out of the 26 books I read in Jan–Jun 2010

In January–June 2010, I read 5,351 pages of books (+1,075 pages more than during the previous six months, July–December 2009) and listened to 124 hours of audiobooks.

My top six picks out the 26 items (paper and audio together), in a tough competition, were as follows:

1. Literature and the Economics of Liberty: Spontaneous Order in Culture
Literary criticism that uses real economics for analysis instead of Marxist reductionism! This is a deep-level game changer.

2. The Economics and Ethics of Private Property [direct PDF link]
Outstanding collection of essays on political philosophy and
economic theory, including Hoppe's eye-opening discourse ethics reasoning, which takes some of Habermas' work in a new direction (Habermas was his dissertation advisor).

3. The Theory of Dynamic Efficiency [direct PDF link]
Economic theory that puts the real life back into economic theory, and puts economic theory back into real life. Identifies and fixes the major departures from reality that mainstream economic theory made.

4. Snow Crash [Link to Audible version, which was outstanding]
Science fiction novel. When I finished listening, I just went back to the start to go through it again without pausing! Even though some of the tech details are a little dated (1992), the book was still that entertaining and interesting.

5. For Good and Evil: The Impact of Taxes on the Course of Civilization
A world history of taxation (hint: it wasn't pretty then or there either).

6. Integral Life Practice
Create a weekly routine that covers all the important bases needed for balanced personal development—exercise, meditation, ethics and more, all in one fully customizable weekly practice model. Helps keep from getting self-sabotaged by leaving out any one major component needed for balance.

The other 20 by category—titles only in no particular order

Political economy
Boundaries of Order: Private Property as a Social System
Memoirs of Ludwig von Mises
The Broken University
How to Win a Cosmic War
Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army
Nuclear Energy in the 21st Century
The Little Book of Bull Moves in Bear Markets [investing]

General philosophy
Inclined to Liberty: The Futile Attempt to Suppress the Human Spirit
The Architecture of Happiness
The One-Two-Three of God
Integral Psychology
Integral Spirituality
Norman Einstein: the Dis-Integration of Ken Wilber

Fiction and fiction related
Learning the World (Sci-fi)
Atlas Shrugged (Novel with social sci-fi aspects)
Pallas (Sci-fi)
Sims (Sci-fi)
Writing the Breakout Novel
The Physics of Star Trek (an analysis of Star Trek sci-tech by a physicist)

Misc.
The Marathon Method