Nathalia Holt is a PhD-turned-writer and journalist; I've previously read two of her later books, 2019's The Queens of Animation: The Untold Story of Nathalia Holt is a PhD-turned-writer and journalist; I've previously read two of her later books, 2019's The Queens of Animation: The Untold Story of the Women Who Transformed the World of Disney and Made Cinematic History and 2022's Wise Gals: The Spies Who Built the CIA and Changed the Future of Espionage. Her 2016 book Rise of the Rocket Girls flows in a similar vein, highlighting women who worked in traditionally male-dominated fields in the 20th century and did not often get the credit and respect they were due. Holt spent around 5 years researching and reporting on this book, including conducting extensive interviews with many of the "computers" who worked at Caltech's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) from the 1940s thru the 1970s, and focused the manuscript on around half a dozen long-tenured employees.
While this book is certainly well-researched (the footnotes in the back are quite extensive), I have a few main issues driving my 3-star rating: 1) info dumping. Holt goes into extensive detail on miniature quite often, from what the women were wearing at work (why?) 2) lack of contextualization of the computers' and the overall JPL contributions to these overarching, multi-site NASA missions 3) lack of contextualization of women in science, math and engineering roles outside of Caltech during that era- like the fellow computers profiled in Hidden Figures, other women who worked at NASA during this era (like Apollo engineer Margaret Hamilton), etc. 4) treatment of the women as vapid and girlish, which I thought diminished their accomplishments. I hated the first name references throughout; if this was a biography of men who worked at JPL during this era, I'm sure they'd be referred to by their last names predominantly, and the text wouldn't include references to their work attire, physical appearances, gossip, etc. I wish these women were written as the accomplished professionals they were.
My statistics: Book 128 for 2025 Book 2054 cumulatively ...more
In House of Huawei, Washington Post technology policy reporter Eva Dou traces the history of Chinese technology firm Huawei, from its founding by Ren In House of Huawei, Washington Post technology policy reporter Eva Dou traces the history of Chinese technology firm Huawei, from its founding by Ren Zhengfei in 1987 to its various controversies and geopolitical tensions that extend to the present day. The inner workings and motives of the company are quite secretive, so Dou's research and coverage seems largely limited to information she could scour from published sources, rather than the approach of most business expos茅 books where investigative reporters track down as many primary sources as possible for interview and commentary (in an extreme example, John Carreyrou Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup). That being said, I don't think this was really in Dou's control given her subject matter here. For casual readers, this book will likely read as an info dump, but for those with a vested or prior interest in global technology and West-China relations, this book will be an interesting read.
My statistics: Book 126 for 2025 Book 2052 cumulatively...more
Lisa Rogak is a writer who specializes in writing biographies of well-known figures. In her 2025 book Propaganda Girls, Rogak profiles four women who Lisa Rogak is a writer who specializes in writing biographies of well-known figures. In her 2025 book Propaganda Girls, Rogak profiles four women who worked with the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) across various war theaters during World War II - one well-known figure (German-born American actress Marlene Dietrich) and three lesser-known figures (reporter Betty McDonald, naval wife Jane Smith-Hutton, and Czech lawyer Zuzka Lauwers). All four women were engaged to some extent in , intended to lower the morale of German, Italian, and Japanese troops and turn them against their countries, or at least induce surrender.
This was an interesting book, and I can see why Rogak chose the four women that she did, as each represented a different focus of black propaganda. I did note many instances of my nonfiction pet peeve of speculating about what characters were likely thinking and feeling at a given time -- though I listened to the audiobook version which, as is standard for audiobooks, doesn't include citations, so I'm unsure which primary and secondary sources the author used.
John Miller is a journalist and baseball fan; in his 2025 debut book The Last Manager, he writes a compelling biography of the Hall of Fame Baltimore John Miller is a journalist and baseball fan; in his 2025 debut book The Last Manager, he writes a compelling biography of the Hall of Fame Baltimore Orioles manager . After failing to make the Major Leagues himself, Weaver pivoted to managing minor league baseball in the Orioles farm system from 1957-1967, before being promoted to manage the Orioles in 1968 at the very young age of 38. He had remarkable longevity in the managerial role (both by standards at that time and today), staying at the helm from 1968-1982 before retiring for a few years, then coming back briefly from 1985-1986. He was inducted into the MLB Hall of Fame in 1996 by the Veterans Committee.
My peak MLB fan years were from around 1995-2005, and my allegiance was not with the Orioles, so I wasn't very familiar with Weaver before picking up this book. Miller does a nice job of fleshing out his interesting character, from on-the-field antics, an unconventional coaching style, and an early adoption of data analytics before it became mainstream. Since Weaver passed away over a decade ago, Miller's primary sources were many players and coaches who overlapped with Weaver, so there are a lot what appear to be "baseball tall tales" in the book.
My statistics: Book 124 for 2025 Book 2050 cumulatively...more
Vauhini Vara (b. 1982) is a technology journalist and writer; she spent nearly 10 years at the Wall Street Journal covering tech companies. Her 2025 mVauhini Vara (b. 1982) is a technology journalist and writer; she spent nearly 10 years at the Wall Street Journal covering tech companies. Her 2025 memoir, Searches, is one of the most creative, ambitious memoirs I've read in a long time. This memoir is composed of a series of largely chronological essays about the technology that's become pervasive from the '90s onwards, and how these technologies have fundamentally changed how we function in and even perceive the world. Vara focuses the lens of these stories on her own experiences, sharing intimate details about her technological life, such as her Google search history, her Adsense demographic data, her Amazon product reviews, and her chat transcripts with early versions of ChatGPT as feeds it chapters of her book and asks for feedback and reflection. One of the most powerful chapters in my opinion was chapter 10, Ghosts (adapted from ), in which she presents iterations of a very personal story she prompted ChatGPT to finish about her older sister, who died as a young adult after several years of battling Ewing sarcoma. Though the audiobook version of this chapter gets very repetitive as the same story is read repeatedly with Vara's voice narrating what she wrote and a voice actor, Anastasia Davidson, taking on what sounds like a synthetic voice narrating ChatGPT's contributions (a narrating arrangement followed throughout the book), it's a fascinating meta commentary on the creative process in our post-ChatGPT era.
There are a few other reasons precluding me from 5-starring this book that also stem from its adaptation from the print/Ebook version to an audiobook (which I think overall was very thoughtfully conceptualized). Listening to Vara's very long Google search history, Amazon product reviews, and presentation of survey results about what it's like to be alive as a woman today (chapter 16, which lasts for around 1 hr 20 min and is apparently collated from Mechanical Turk surveys Vara paid women to fill out and presented largely without commentary or analysis) were like nails on a chalkboard for me. I presume these are parts of the written book that people will generally skim rather than read with interest. I also lost interest in most of the long dialogues between Vara and ChatGPT, as honestly I read enough of what ChatGPT writes that I don't need to listen to it for hours longer. I unfortunately also found Chapter 8, I am Hungry to Talk, which is presented in the audiobook as Vara narrating an Spanish language essay in the background while Davidson translates in English in real time, jarring while listening (probably as I understand some Spanish and my brain was attempting to process both languages at once).
I do think Vara's analysis on on-point and important, and this memoir is worth a read and many reflections (though do as I say, not as I did, and pick up the physical book or Ebook, rather than the audiobook). And while you're at it, , and contemplate a) how Google got that impression of you (correctly or not) based on what you inputted, and b) what it's like to live in a society where we all have this vapor trail following us around digitally. I'll share mine from my primary browser (despite largely blocking ads with add-ons) and leave fellow GR users to contemplate what's true and what's false:
Relationships: Married Household income: Moderately high income Education: Bachelor's degree Industry: Not enough info Employer size: Large employer (250-10,000 employees) Homeownership: Homeowners Parenting: Not parents
(ChatGPT was not used to write, revise, or comment on any part of this review ;) )
Jamie Cooperstein runs a hospitality consulting business; in her brief (148 page) 2025 memoir True Hospitality, she writes breezily about her 10 yearsJamie Cooperstein runs a hospitality consulting business; in her brief (148 page) 2025 memoir True Hospitality, she writes breezily about her 10 years working as a concierge in Philadelphia, first in a luxury hotel (the Rittenhouse), then in a nearby luxury high-rise condo (Two Liberty Place).
This was a quick read, with most chapters lasting for only a few pages and largely staying superficial and focused on vignettes (including some gawking, namedropping moments that felt included for salaciousness) without delving too much into the author's feelings or analysis. Though, she does tellingly write:
I knew I wanted to stay in the world of luxury hospitality...the level of discernment and service I'd grown accustomed to and was groomed to provide for a clientele that enjoyed limousines, bottle service and acclaimed chefs - all of which I'd enjoyed learning about, test deriving, and enhancing my own life with. Everything looked so glamorous especially when you were seeing only a small snapshot of the guest's actual life whole they vacationed. I wanted to be a jet-setter too. I yearned ot find a successful attorney or notable doctor to be my life partner and travel companion and have someone put rose petals on our bed.
So the work brought her a lot of wish fulfilment and fantasy too. That was the main pull of tension I sensed in the work -- her resentment at some of the spoiled, overly demanding clients juxtaposed with her not-so-secret desire to be one of them. Very similar vibes to Stephanie Kiser's memoir Wanted: Toddler's Personal Assistant about working as (highly-paid) nanny to affluent New York families.
Ultimately, Cooperstein transitioned from being a concierge to consulting in hospitality, after she married a doctor and his income (who, coincidentally, she was set up with via a resident at her luxury condo complex).
Joe Dunthorne is an English novelist. Children of Radium is a nonfiction family memoir tracing the story of Dunthorne's great-grandfather Siegfried MeJoe Dunthorne is an English novelist. Children of Radium is a nonfiction family memoir tracing the story of Dunthorne's great-grandfather Siegfried Merzbacher, a German-Jewish chemist whose work helped develop Nazi hazardous agents used during World War II. Though Merzbacher and his immediate family fled to Turkey and survived the war, many extended family and friend were not as fortunate. Merzbacher left behind voluminous but apparently not very well-written unpublished memoirs when he passed away, and Children of Radium seems to be Dunthorne's quest to honor his great-grandfather's legacy as he contended with his complicated feelings after the death of his grandmother (Merzbacher's daughter) and his family becoming naturalized as dual German-British citizens (basically to regain EU privileges after Brexit).
This is a brief memoir but still came across as unfocused to me -- probably owing to the fact that there's still a lot of unknowns about his great-grandfather's life -- a reminder that even as copiously as one writes, there can still be so much left unsaid.
My statistics: Book 120 for 2025 Book 2046 cumulatively...more
Bernie Marcus (1929-2024) and Arthur Blank (1942-) co-founded the Home Depot, a Georgia-based home improvement warehouse chain that has stores all oveBernie Marcus (1929-2024) and Arthur Blank (1942-) co-founded the Home Depot, a Georgia-based home improvement warehouse chain that has stores all over North America, in 1978. Their 1999 business memoir, written alongside professional writer Bob Andelman, tells the story of the founding of Home Depot 20 years on in typical braggadocious business speak of the late '90s. I found this book interesting in parts, dry and repetitive in other parts. It would be interesting to get an updated afterward to this book now that the Home Depot is nearing its 50th anniversary -- the stores today seem quite different from how Marcus and Blank describe them 25 years ago.
In my 3rd fiction read for 2025, I picked a book that I'm sure has inspired many English doctoral level dissertations, Daphne du Maurier's 1938 gothicIn my 3rd fiction read for 2025, I picked a book that I'm sure has inspired many English doctoral level dissertations, Daphne du Maurier's 1938 gothic thriller Rebecca. I read the book largely unspoiled, having never seen any of the film adaptations or clicked the spoiler-walled text of my GR friends' reviews. This was an entertaining, provocative novel reminiscent of earlier gothic works in the typical English major's canon that was definitely worth the read. Now onto the spoilered section...
(view spoiler)[I would say there is enough foreshadowing in the book that the revelations in the final third didn't come as a surprise to me. Early on, when we meet our never-first-named narrator and she meets Maxim de Winter, a man twice her age who simultaneously infantilizes her and treats her cruelly, and generally seems brooding and dangerous, my initial reaction to learning that his first wife died (probably inspired by today's true crime stories) was "oh, he must have killed her."
The Kindle edition I read had an afterword by the late writer Sally Beauman whose analysis resonated with me. She discussed how parts of du Maurier's personality were likely fused into the dual characters of Rebecca and the unnamed narrator - the private rebellion (Rebecca), and the outward quiet compliance (narrator). I do read Rebecca and the narrator as two sides of the same character, with the narrator being the hollow remnants of a much more vibrant, strong-willed character that's largely been extinguished (at least outwardly) by the patriarchal society of England between the two world wars. There were occasional flashes of Rebecca's willfulness that managed to escape into the narrator's actions, like purposely breaking a de Winter family heirloom (told in a very depersonalized way) and moments of coldness and cruelty that that are out-of-character for the narrator's mild mouse personality. Rebecca's way of existing in society was too brazen so she had to be put down in some way (either from her husband's gun or the cancer that would have killed her otherwise), but more subtle acts of defiance can persist. Once Rebecca's remains are found and Maxim confesses to the narrator that he killed her, the narrator morphs from her affected "Alice in Wonderland" innocent persona to a much older, jaded one, their marriage is finally consummated (reading between the lines), and while she outwardly helps Maxim escape punishment for his crimes, she relegates him to a life in exile -- Manderly having gone up in smoke -- with her presence and the spectre of Rebecca continuing to haunt them.
A strong 4-star read for me -- my main critique is that the first 2/3rds of the book drags on way too long. (hide spoiler)]
Fiction book 3/10 for 2025 Book 118 for 2025 Book 2044 cumulatively...more
In her 2025 book Atomic Dreams, and despite the broad-sounding title and subtitle, journalist Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow reports on the story of the In her 2025 book Atomic Dreams, and despite the broad-sounding title and subtitle, journalist Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow reports on the story of the . The Diablo Canyon plant has been controversial for many years, as it's near several fault lines, and many continue to grapple with the ethics and safety of nuclear power as a clean(er) energy source compared to burning fossil fuels (generating carbon emissions and exacerbating climate change) and even renewable energy sources like wind turbines and solar panels (the materials for which aren't necessarily clean to manufacture or to dispose of). Tuhus-Dubrow researched and interviewed many key figures in the Diablo Canyon debate, including politicians supporting or opposing legislation to keep the plant open, social organizations both pro- and anti-nuclear power, many of whom with vested interests in this plant in particular (and increasingly wielding social media and influencers to sway the discussion), scientists and engineers who work and research in the nuclear energy space, and indigenous peoples who claim right to the land on which the plant is built. Tuhus-Dubrow makes an insightful point that historically, progressives have opposed nuclear energy on emotional grounds, but as climate change worsens, many are now softening their stance, recognizing nuance in the issue, or even switching stances entirely (the author herself admits she started her research in the anti category and, while she's not a "nuclearist" (the somewhat demeaning nickname she coined for pro-nuclear power folks) after finishing this book, she now understands the issue is more complex than she initially realized).
This is an interesting read, though I can't comment on the strength of the research (as footnotes, per usual, are not included on audiobooks). I'd recommend it with the caveat that it's focused on one specific nuclear plant, and not a more expansive discussion of the state of nuclear energy in the US or globally in general.
Eliot Stein is a journalist who runs a BBC column called , where he travels the world to find unique artisans and dying traditions; many ofEliot Stein is a journalist who runs a BBC column called , where he travels the world to find unique artisans and dying traditions; many of these same stories are explored in more depth in this eclectic book. For instance, Stein traveled to Sardinia to track down the last artisan making , to Taiwan to interview , and to Eutin, Germany where . There are also many vignettes that don't seem to have appeared in Custom Made, like traditions of English beekeepers, Kerala mirror artisans, and Cuban factory lectors (professional readers who read aloud newspapers and books to factory workers -- a role that I'm shocked has survived past the Walkman era). Stein tells these stories with a lot of sentimentality, sometimes bordering on the maudlin (similar to Nate DiMeo in The Memory Palace: True Short Stories of the Past - I was frequently reminded of that book while reading this one), expressing regret that many of these traditions will likely die out once the last people skilled in these traits are no longer around. I suppose I'm less sentimental, and my perspective is that many things aren't meant to last, for better or for worse. Still, definitely a very interesting read that would have broad appeal.
Erika Howsare is a poet and writer. In 2024's The Age of Deer, she explores the nuanced history of humans' relationships with deer, from one extreme (Erika Howsare is a poet and writer. In 2024's The Age of Deer, she explores the nuanced history of humans' relationships with deer, from one extreme (humans going to great lengths to save wounded deer, protest deer culling, etc.) to the other (humans going to great lengths to hunt deer, win hunting prizes for the most impressive specimens, etc.), as well as the middle ground (federal, state, and municipal programs navigating culling and birth control programs, roadkill issues, public safety, and other topics).
I've been a vegetarian for almost three decades, yet have almost always cared for cats who are obligate carnivores; my current two eat venison (deer meat) as a regular part of their diet, so I know these ethical dilemmas well. I confess I fast-forwarded through several parts of this audiobook that get quite graphic. Overall, I found this book thought-provoking and uncomfortable (but in a good way).
Bill Eddy is a lawyer and mediator who's espoused the concept of BIFF communication (brief, informative, friendly and firm) to deal with HCPs (high coBill Eddy is a lawyer and mediator who's espoused the concept of BIFF communication (brief, informative, friendly and firm) to deal with HCPs (high conflict personalities) and difficult communication in general, with the goal of deescalating heated situations to restore (more) functional dynamics. 2021's BIFF at Work (written with Megan Hunter, who coaches on dealing with difficult communications) is a follow-up to Eddy's previous book, 2011's BIFF: Quick Responses to High Conflict People, Their Hostile Emails, Personal Attacks and Social Media Meltdowns, that focuses on BIFF communication in the workplace setting.
I appreciated that this is a very practical and succinct book. Much of the book consists of Eddy and Hunter presenting various challenging scenarios, writing an off-the-cuff response that many of us would be tempted to send (much of the book focuses on written communication, though a few vignettes at the end focus on verbal communication), analyzing why these reactionary responses are not BIFFs in a methodical, logical manner, and then re-writing them in BIFF style. The checklist they use to determine if a response is a BIFF or not:
- is it necessary to respond in this situation? (if no, then don't respond) - is it brief? - is it informative? - is it friendly? - is it firm? - does it contain advice, admonishments, or apologies? (if yes to any of these, it's not a BIFF, as these are sticking points that may further escalate rather than deescalate the situation)
In the final section, Eddy and Hunter present brief tips on coaching others to write BIFFs -- basically, it's asking them the questions above, as well as asking them to predict how the other person is likely to respond to the message, and if this predicted reaction is likely to lead to escalation or deescalation.
Definitely a useful book and method that I'll be working to implement in my own communications.
My statistics: Book 112 for 2025 Book 2038 cumulatively...more
Jaap de Roode is a professor of biology at Emory University . In his 2025 book, Doctors by Nature, de RoodeJaap de Roode is a professor of biology at Emory University . In his 2025 book, Doctors by Nature, de Roode focuses on animal behaviors that, unwittingly or intentionally, have beneficial impacts on their health in their natural habitats -- like honeybee propolis ("bee glue") being antimicrobial for honeybee colonies, dogs eating grass to provide protection from parasites, caterpillars eating milkweed for similarly antiparasitic reasons, and cats going crazy for and rolling around in catnip as it may protect against mosquito bites. de Roode underpins these findings with the fact that many human medicines (homeopathic remedies as well as many mainstream antibiotics and anticancer drugs) have also been derived from natural sources, some of which were initially identified by humans observing animals' use of specific plants from which the active compounds were isolated and investigated. Some of the research detailed is de Roode's own, while other parts comes from other labs studying animal behavior in what sound to me like well-designed experiments; it fits in with the common thread of the evolutionary arms race of defenses and counter-defenses members of an ecosystem engage in for continued species survival (there are a lot of similar themes explored in Richard Dawkins' latest book The Genetic Book of the Dead: A Darwinian Reverie). I am not sure that calling this behavior doctoring is the best choice of wording (de Roode uses this phrase many times throughout the book, talking about how animals are natural doctors), as that implies a level of basic knowledge and intentionality underpinning acts that seem to be largely instinctual for animals; still, I found this an enjoyable, informative read.
Jane Rosenberg has a very niche, fascinating job -- she is a professional courtroom artist. As cameras aren't allowed inside the courtroom in most US Jane Rosenberg has a very niche, fascinating job -- she is a professional courtroom artist. As cameras aren't allowed inside the courtroom in most US federal cases, the only visual depictions capturing the proceedings are hand-drawn by a small cadre of professionals employed or freelancing for media outlets.
Rosenberg's 2024 memoir Drawn Testimony reflects upon her 40-year career including many high-profile and memorable cases, her impressions of the justice system (there is no obligation for courtroom sketch artists to be fair and impartial in their opinions -- only the requirement to draw what they saw in the courtroom accurately), and the time she accidentally became the story (for drawing NFL pro Tom Brady in a way that made it look like his facial features were melting). Various sketches are included in the Ebook version, though I was disappointed that they were all rendered in grayscale in the Kindle edition (Rosenberg sketches them in full color using pastels), though not as many sketches as Rosenberg describes in the text (this book would have been the perfect opportunity to include more art, not less!).
Lawrence Anthony (1950-2012) was a South African conservationist and generally fascinating human being. His 2009 book The Elephant Whisperer, written Lawrence Anthony (1950-2012) was a South African conservationist and generally fascinating human being. His 2009 book The Elephant Whisperer, written with Graham Spence, spans around 10 years' time and tells the story of a herd of wild African elephants that Anthony took into the animal reserve he managed, Thula Thula, in 1999, as well as other adventure stories of life at Thula Thula in the pre-smartphone era (reader discretion advised - there's a lot of violence and death described - this is not particularly a feel-good book). Anthony's bond with the elephants seemed quite extraordinary, particularly for elephants raised in the wild, though the history of human:elephant interactions goes back centuries (particularly with Asian elephants who humans have trained to do logging work and heavy lifting - see Elephant Company: The Inspiring Story of an Unlikely Hero and the Animals Who Helped Him Save Lives in World War II). That being said, this book itself came across as embellished and scattershot in parts -- Anthony seemed like such a high energy person that he was unlikely to sit down for hours and write, so I wonder if the writing process of this book was that he spent hours telling stories to Graham Spence who then wrote them down in an engaging, action movie-esque script to emulate Anthony's frenetic lifestyle.
Anthony's widow, Francoise, continues to run Thula Thula and has written several follow-up books about the elephant herd featured here, including 2018's An Elephant in My Kitchen and 2022's The Elephants of Thula Thula.
My statistics: Book 109 for 2025 Book 2035 cumulatively...more
William Vanderbloemen is a pastor-turned-executive-recruiter for religious leadership roles. In his 2023 leadership development book Be the Unicorn, wWilliam Vanderbloemen is a pastor-turned-executive-recruiter for religious leadership roles. In his 2023 leadership development book Be the Unicorn, where he leveraged his connection to get a glowing forward by John Maxwell, he presents findings from extensive surveys he's conducted of "unicorns" - people who stand out in various facets of the business world by being exceptional at various traits including likeability, persistence, and responsiveness. He presents each of the 12 unicorn traits with many personal anecdotes, some of which really shouldn't be lauded (like how he and his firm test candidates' response times by sending them late night texts and rewarding those who respond right away -- neglecting boundaries and common phone do not disturb settings). He also namedrops quite a bit, like wringing out the anecdote of how he met former US president Bill Clinton over several different unicorn traits. I think the biggest flaw of the book, however, is that what's a so-called unicorn trait for one job may be something totally undesirable or detrimental for a different job, which Vanderbloemen fails to point out. For instance, if you're looking for an executive assistant who's responsive 24/7 and has no personal boundaries they're unwilling to cross, by all means test them by sending them an 11 PM text, but if you're looking for an executive director whose primary strength should be honing your organization's vision and big picture output, you're unlikely to find many in that camp who'll respond to 11 PM texts before they're even hired and getting paid (or even after).
Overall, lots of better business and leadership development books out there told with more humility and circumspection. A few of my top recommendations are:
Kari Ferrell (b. 1987) is a Korean-American adoptee who became Internet Notorious in 2009 as "the Hipster Grifter" for scamming her friends and hookupKari Ferrell (b. 1987) is a Korean-American adoptee who became Internet Notorious in 2009 as "the Hipster Grifter" for scamming her friends and hookups (several years before fake heiress Anna Delvey became Internet Notorious for similar cons on a grander scale); she served prison time for these offenses. Ferrell's 2025 memoir, You'll Never Believe Me, recounts her life so far, from being a transracial adoptee, growing up in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in the Salt Lake City, Utah, area, engaging in criminal behavior from her teens into her twenties, her incarceration, and her post-prison life including going to therapy (as the title alludes to) and visiting South Korea for the first time in her 30s.
I felt like Ferrell portrayed herself as a victim far too much in this memoir - basically chalking up her criminal activities to the past traumas she never dealt with until her late 20s. While many adoptees struggle with issues of abandonment, and transracial adoptees (particularly those of color raised by White families without connection to their cultures or countries of origin) can have a tough time with identity formation and integration, I think it's fair to assume that the vast majority of these adoptees don't commit felonies on their way to healing or as a retributive way to deal with systemic racism. Ferrell didn't just commit crimes against strangers or big corporations, but a large part of her grift was stealing from her friends. Even by the end of the book and after years of therapy, she didn't seem very sorry about what she did -- she just found more ways to rationalize it.
Dalton Conley is a who holds both a PhD in sociology from Columbia and a later-in-life PhD in biology fDalton Conley is a who holds both a PhD in sociology from Columbia and a later-in-life PhD in biology from NYU; his research focuses on the interaction between genes (particularly polygenic indices, PGIs, which are constructed based on combinations of inherited gene variants obtained from genome-wide association studies) and behavior (both on an individual level and a society-wide level). In his 2025 book The Social Genome, he opens with the story of how he and his second wife decided to have a child, and how he, in all seriousness, sought to eugenically engineer this child by selecting for embryos with favorable PGIs for traits he was selecting for -- thankfully, however, it appears these requests were not entertained. (This is the same man who named his first two children from his first marriage , and as much as I hoped this was satire, it appears to be true).
The rest of the book is very "out there." And I say this as an MD and PhD who clinically practices in the diagnostic genomics space and envisions a mid-term future where whole genome sequencing is more widely adopted by the general public (for better of worse). In 2025, genomic medicine is at the level of defining and characterizing single gene alterations that lead to disease, as well as pathway-level alterations that lead to disease phenotypes, and in some cases, providing gene therapy and gene-targeted chemotherapy. Things get blurry and veer far away from evidence-based practice the more you move from single gene variants to polygenic risk scores (particularly if the variants composing such scores are not well-characterized on an individual level) as a way of risk stratification. Conley proposes a lot more than that in this book, and many of these propositions made me deeply uncomfortable. I would advise fellow readers, particularly laypeople, to treat this book as more of a work of science fiction than science fact.
My statistics: Book 106 for 2025 Book 2032 cumulatively...more
We Are the Baby-Sitters Club is a series of essays edited by Marisa Crawford and Megan Milks about adults reflecting back on their experiences with thWe Are the Baby-Sitters Club is a series of essays edited by Marisa Crawford and Megan Milks about adults reflecting back on their experiences with the Baby-Sitters Club media empire, including the original series of books by Ann M. Martin, the various spinoff books, the '90s made-for-TV adaption, the '90s movie, the 2020-2022 Netflix remake, the graphic novels, and, apparently, fanfiction. As with any eclectic essay collection, there were hits and misses. The standout essay for me was writer Gabrielle Moss' contribution about how the Baby-Sitters books fit into and reshaped the YA and young reader genres in the late '80s and '90s, as I recognized a lot of the book series mentioned (having dabbled in many of those series in as a '90s kid). Many essays talked about the way people of color have been represented in the series, exploring Jessi Ramsay (the only canonically Black main character) and Claudia Kishi (the only canonically Japanese main character) in depth, often with conflicting viewpoints between essayists. Several also talked about LGBTQ representation in the series, mostly exploring how the character of Kristy Thomas is queer-coded but never openly stated to be queer, and how this upset several essayists. And several essays dive into the deep end of Baby-Sitters club fan fiction, where it's clear the authors are using the characters as vehicles to channel their own fixations, which is...frankly much of fanfiction regardless of the fandom.
Personally, though I read several dozen Baby-Sitters Club books between roughly the ages of 8-11, they were never my favorites, as I found the topic of baby-sitting kids utterly unappealing, and the interpersonal dynamics of bunch of adolescents similarly non-gripping. I never had a character I identified strongly with (as many of the essayists here do), and it's not a series I've thought about in several decades. To this series' credit, I did find it more compelling than the vapidity of Sweet Valley High. I was a voracious reader as a kid, but my favorites from ages 8-11 were more along the lines of the action-packed mysteries (Hardy Boys, the Three Investigators), often with sci-fi or fantasy elements (The Dark Is Rising sequence, various Anne McCaffrey and Bruce Coville books) that focused less on relationship.
That being said, for those who enjoyed this series or its spin-offs, this'll probably be a nice nostalgia read as well as provide connections to various social media sites where these interests can be revisited.
My statistics: Book 103 for 2025 Book 2029 cumulatively...more
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