The Stack

The library and the projection room.

A semi-live snapshot of what I'm reading and what I've watched. Pulled from Goodreads and IMDb; refreshed when I remember to. (Yes — I use IMDb's "watchlist" backwards. It's a record of what I've seen.)

Last refreshed · May 2026

118
books read
since Feb 2021
41
currently reading
at last count
624
films watched
tracked since 2020
56
in the queue
"to watch" list
Shelf I · Currently reading

On the side table.

Three open at once. The Saunders is the morning book, the Murakami sits by the kettle, the Piyush Mishra travels.

Spine I · Picked up Apr 2026
Vigil
George Saunders
Reading a chapter a morning. Saunders writes the way I want to think when I'm tired — patient, generous, willing to look at the same small thing twice.
Spine II · 15% in
Birthday Stories
Selected and introduced by Haruki Murakami
An anthology of birthday stories, picked by Murakami. The introductions are better than half the stories — which is its own kind of treat.
Spine III · 24% in
Tumhari Auqaat Kya Hai, Piyush Mishra
Piyush Mishra
The Hindi I should have grown up reading more of. Half memoir, half manifesto, half poetry — yes, three halves, that's how it works.
Spine IV · Queued
Next up · TBD
— filling these as I go —
Placeholder spine for the next book in line. Updating live-ish.
Spine V · Queued
Next up · TBD
— filling these as I go —
Placeholder spine for the next book in line.
Spine VI · Queued
Next up · TBD
— filling these as I go —
Placeholder spine for the next book in line.
Spine VII · Queued
Next up · TBD
— filling these as I go —
Placeholder spine for the next book in line.
Shelf II · 5★ on Goodreads · books I've handed to friends

The bookshop window.

The face-out display. Books I've physically given to people, or texted them to buy. R. K. Narayan dominates this row — that isn't an accident.

Shelf III · The projection room

Films I'd defend at dinner.

35mm in spirit. The 10/10 list is short on purpose — these are the films I'd rewatch on a flight, on a Sunday, on a hard day. Click a poster to swap the screen.

Now showing — projected on a loop

Perfect Days

Wim Wenders · 2023 · 2h 4m Rated 10

Hirayama cleans Tokyo's toilets, listens to cassettes, photographs trees. A film about how small attention compounds.

9
The Shawshank Redemption
Darabont · 1994
9
The Irishman
Scorsese · 2019
9
Parasite
Bong · 2019
8
Ford v Ferrari
Mangold · 2019
List · In the queue
To watch in the future
Films I keep coming back to before bed and then putting off because the day's been too long.
56 titles
List · Comfort
Stand-up specials
When the day's been heavy and the brain wants jokes that don't require thinking.
40 titles
Shelf IV · The archive

Everything else, lightly catalogued.

The denser end. Books and films I've logged but haven't pulled out for the front shelf — for when you want to dig.

Books · the rest of the read pile
· — refreshing from Goodreads soon —a rolling pull of the last 30 titles, with my rating in progress
· Author countse.g. R. K. Narayan ×6, Wodehouse ×4, Murakami ×3 — once it pulls live in progress
Films · everything I've logged
· — refreshing from IMDb soon —a rolling pull of the last 50 titles, with my rating in progress
· By decadeheaviest in the 2010s; surprised by how light the 80s are in progress

— end of stack — refreshed when I remember to —