Sekar Writes
A Collection of (Mostly Nonfiction) Books Review and Personal Notes
Welcome!
Take a look around my blog, where I bring you book reviews filled with knowledges and favorite quotes. Alongside my literary explorations, I share personal stories and some side projects.
Latest Nonfiction Book Reviews
Check out my nonfiction book reviews, featuring thoughts, summaries, and favorite quotes.
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Review: Be Ready When the Luck Happens
What happens when a memoir talks about luck but skips the struggles behind it? Be Ready When the Luck Happens left me with mixed feelings.
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Review and Summary: The Everyday Naturalist
Struggling to enjoy nature? The Everyday Naturalist offers a mindful way to reconnect with the outdoors and find peace through observation.
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Review: Something in the Woods Loves You
Something in the Woods Loves You shows how nature, like birds, trees, and stillness, can gently support healing and slow living.
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Review: Is A River Alive?
Is A River Alive? blends travel writing, nature writing, and big-picture thinking in a way thatās both grounded and expansive.
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Review: We Can Do Hard Things
This book promises answers to lifeās hardest questions but does it deliver? Hereās what I discovered after reading We Can Do Hard Things.
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Review: Too Much of Life
Too Much of Life is a collection that might change how you see the ordinary. This is where everyday moments become profound and emotional.
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Review: The Gifts of Reading
Can giving a book change a life? This powerful essay by Robert Macfarlane might just change how you see the power of sharing books.
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Review and Summary: The Neural Mind
The Neural Mind explore how cognitive science, computatioal modeling, and linguistics reveal the mindās hidden wiring.
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Review and Summary: 100 Ways to Improve Your Writing
Struggling with writing? 100 Ways to Improve Your Writing shares easy tips to make your words clearer and stronger.
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Review and Summary: The Book of Alchemy
Journaling doesnāt have to be awkward. The Book of Alchemy shows you how it can actually feel healing and make you really want to write.
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Review and Summary: Turning to Stone
Turning to Stone is a book where a geologist writes about rocks and the search for meaning in a world that wonāt sit still.
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Review and Summary: Tiny Experiments
In a world obsessed with purpose-driven careers, Tiny Experiments offers a reminder: maybe we donāt need to chase one grand calling.
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Review and Summary: The Notebook
Notebooks seem simple, but their story isnāt. The Notebook by Roland Allen shows how they shaped thought and creativity.
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Review and Summary: The Backyard Bird Chronicles
Amy Tan turns everyday birdwatching into a beautifully illustrated nature journal that gently shifts how you see the world around you.
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Review: 1000 Words
Jami Attenberg and fellow writers share inspiring insights on staying creative, focused, and productive throughout the writing year.
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Review: On Character
In short, reflective chapters, a retired general shares his life journey and how his views have evolved over time.
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Review: There Lives A Young Girl in Me Who Will Not Die
Haunting, honest, and beautifully translated, The Young Girl in Me Who Will Not Die captures the deepest parts of life and feeling.
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Review: Ordinary Time
Staying isnāt always easy but it can be meaningful. Ordinary Time shares personal essays on faith, place, and life in the quiet middle.
Browse Nonfiction Books by Specific Genre
Have a specific book topic in mind?
Youāll likely find it in these categories!
- Biographies and Memoirs (32)
- Biology and Life Sciences (12)
- Child Development and Parenting (13)
- Climate Change (2)
- Cooking and Culinary (3)
- Critical Thinking and Research Skills (15)
- Data and Statistics (8)
- Economics (6)
- Education and Learning (10)
- Essays (26)
- Evolutionary Biology (6)
- Fitness and Human Performance (23)
- Health and Medicine (30)
- Leadership and Career (8)
- Life Transitions (11)
- Linguistics (4)
- Literature (2)
- Luck and Chance (3)
- Mathematics (2)
- Mindfulness (3)
- Nature (21)
- Neuroscience (13)
- Poetry (15)
- Politics and Society (41)
- Productivity (25)
- Psychology and Behavioral Science (49)
- Science (44)
- Self-Development (78)
- Technology and AI (10)
- UI/UX (2)
- Women's Studies (6)
- Writing (9)
From Facts to Fiction
Nonfiction teaches me about the world, but fiction helps me feel it.
Every review comes with the quotes I saved ā maybe you’ll want to save them too.
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Review: Dream Count
Dream Count tells of four Nigerian women navigating love, loss, and betrayal. A premise with a promising start, but a finish that let me down.
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Review: The Things We Never Say
The Things We Never Say is Artie’s story, a history teacher asking if life is worth staying for. A light read, heavy with all we never say.
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Review: Yesteryear
Yesteryear follows a tradwife influencer pulled into the life she markets online. A bold take on gender and faith.
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Review: Audition
Audition by Katie Kitamura is a literary fiction about identity, performance, and the cost of the roles we play.
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Review: The Correspondent
One woman. Letters that say everything. Guilt, love, and grace hidden between every line and it is entirely yours to piece together.
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Review: The Names
A son. A name. A single moment that reshapes an entire family’s fate. The Names will make you take a look back at your own life differently.
Life in the Margins
Here’s what else you’ll find on this blog.
Reading Life
- Snapshots of my reading life: the habits, the tracking, and everything around the books.
Journaling
- Writing is how I make sense of things. A look at my journaling practice: how I do it, why I do it, and what it’s given me.
Fresh Flower Care
- There’s something grounding about tending to fresh flowers. My personal notes on keeping them beautiful and alive for longer.
Home Gardening
- Growing things at home with a lot of curiosity. A record of my small gardening experiments, wins and failures included.
Life in Helsinki, Finland
- Living in Helsinki has shaped how I read, think, and move through the world. A little window into daily life in the north.
Hi, I am Sekar!
My passion for reading (at least) one book a week fuels my love for books and drives me to share the insights with others.
Medical science by training, curious about everything else. Here I share my hobbies and the things life teaches me.
Feel free to reach out and join me in celebrating books and all the small joys that make life fuller.
Books let us know we’re not the center of the universe; the universe has many centers.
Mariahadessa Ekere Tallie