Sami Al-Khalili

https://www.goodreads.com/callmesam

Sami’s Bookshelves

to-read‎ (573)
currently-reading‎ (5)
read‎ (181)
did-not-finish‎ (0)
all-books-poetry‎ (26)
all-books-music‎ (4)
dont-read-but-i-did‎ (4)

crucial-psychology-must-reads‎ (3)
all-books-about-politics‎ (2)
dark-psychology-and-forensics‎ (2)
first-nations-history-canada‎ (2)
fun-neuroscience‎ (2)
helped-thyself‎ (2)
roaring-twenties-to-post-modern‎ (2)

americano-politics‎ (1)
eastern-spirituality-and-religion‎ (1)
graphic-novels‎ (1)
musicians-learners-degree‎ (1)
musicians-memoirs‎ (1)
on-acting‎ (1)
philosophy‎ (1)

poker-stuff‎ (1)
relationship-goals‎ (1)
writers-column‎ (1)
non-fiction-gimmicks‎ (0)

Stats | More…

Sami is Currently Reading

Sami Al-Khalili is currently reading

In the Mind's Eye: Visual Thinkers, Gifted People With Dyslexia and Other Learning Difficulties, Computer Images and the Ironies of Creativity

by Thomas G. West

bookshelves: currently-reading

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

Nov 01, 2025 08:38AM

Sami Al-Khalili is currently reading

Forge

by Jan Zwicky

bookshelves: currently-reading, all-books-poetry

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

Oct 20, 2025 08:05AM

Sami Al-Khalili is currently reading

Racing Hummingbirds

by Jeanann Verlee (Goodreads Author)

bookshelves: currently-reading

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

progress:

(page 30 of 112)
"One of the best books of poetry I’ve read in awhile." — Oct 22, 2025 07:56AM

Oct 16, 2025 08:11AM

See all 5 books that Sami is reading…

Sami’s Notes & Highlights

Book cover for An Introduction to Arab Poetics

An Introduction to Arab Poetics by Adonis

2 highlights

Pre-Islamic poetry was born as song; it developed as something heard and not read, sung and not written. The voice in this poetry was the breath of life — ‘body music’. It was both speech and something which went beyond speech. It conveyed ...more

Sami Al-Khalili and 1 other person liked this

A Fair Country: Telling Truths About Canada

by John Ralston Saul

1 note & 2 highlights

Sami’s Quotes

“Who better represents us, other than our Gods and their stories?” “What”
― Bala Krishna, Gods and their stories: A Short Story

2 likes

“Solitude helps you to convert your time into clarity of purpose.”
― Sunday Adelaja, How To Become Great Through Time Conversion: Are you wasting time, spending time or investing time?

tags: calling, clarity, clarity-of-purpose, conversion, convert, gift, great, greatness, helps, humanity, life, poverty, produce, product, productivity, purpose, solitude, time, time-conversion, value, waste, wealth, work, world

2 likes

“I’ve read that one out of twenty-four people is a sociopath, and if you ask me, the other twenty-three of you should be worried.”
― Lisa Scottoline, Every Fifteen Minutes

1040 likes

“Tolerance is a poor substitute for embrace.”
― Jamie Arpin-Ricci

tags: community, embrace, inclusion, tolerance, welcome

16 likes

“The notion of "cause and effect" is sometimes useful in real life, and it can even be interesting in art, but I'm more interested in "cause and cause" or "effect and effect" or "and and and".”
― kevin mcpherson eckhoff

tags: and, art, cause-and-effect, fart, interesting, literature, rhizome, truth

4 likes

More of Sami’s quotes…

recent posts
Sami’s Groups

Poet’s Lake — 410 members — last activity Jan 24, 2026 10:54AM
To all my fellow poets, this is for you 💌 Welcome to Poet’s Lake, a secret hideout for us writers to gather and share our creative works. Here, you’r ...more

¡ POETRY ! — 22533 members — last activity Apr 13, 2026 03:25PM
No pretensions: just poetry. Stop by, recommend books, offer up poems (excerpted), tempt us, taunt us, tell us what to read and where to go (to read No pretensions: just poetry. Stop by, recommend books, offer up poems (excerpted), tempt us, taunt us, tell us what to read and where to go (to read it!) Goodreads honors wordsmiths: poets and poetry promoted and prompted here. ~~~ "Poetry is the synthesis of hyacinths and biscuits." -- Carl Sandburg “God has a brown voice, as soft and full as beer.” —Anne Sexton On Clouds – “…what primitive tastes the ancients must have had if their poets were inspired by those absurd, untidy clumps of mist, idiotically jostling one another about…” —Yevgeny Zamyatin “If the poet wants to be a poet, the poet must force the poet to revise. If the poet doesn’t wish to revise, let the poet abandon poetry and take up stamp-collecting or real estate.” —Donald Hall “Poetry is a rich, full-bodied whistle, cracked ice crunching in pails, the night that numbs the leaf, the duel of two nightingales, the sweet pea that has run wild, Creation’s tears in shoulder blades.” —Boris Pasternak “Wanted: a needle swift enough to sew this poem into a blanket.” —Charles Simic “Language is a cracked kettle on which we beat out tunes for bears to dance to, while all the time we long to move the stars to pity.” —Gustave Flaubert “Poetry is not an expression of the party line. It’s that time of night, lying in bed, thinking what you really think, making the private world public, that’s what the poet does.” —Allen Ginsberg. ~~~~~ Amy King, Moderator Amy King is the recipient of the 2015 Winner of the WNBA Award (Women’s National Book Association). Her latest collection, The Missing Museum, is a winner of the 2015 Tarpaulin Sky Book Prize. She serves on the executive board of VIDA: Women in Literary Arts and is co-editing with Heidi Lynn Staples the anthology, Big Energy Poets of the Anthropocene: When Ecopoets Think Climate Change. She is also co-editing the anthology, Bettering American Poetry 2015, and is an Associate Professor of Creative Writing at SUNY Nassau Community College. ...more

The Gothic Poets Society — 401 members — last activity Dec 31, 2024 07:03PM
Wits, Words & Spirits! Who Are We? We are a group of like minded individuals who haunt dark halls and cemeteries, armed with pens, books and black li ...more