en-US Mon, 14 Apr 2025 19:28:27 -0700 60 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg 208433088 232 Stefano Calzati 0262546213 Christian 0 to-read 0.0
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name: Christian
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]]> 202352663 240 Alan F. Blackwell 0262548712 Christian 0 to-read 4.50
author: Alan F. Blackwell
name: Christian
average rating: 4.50
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rating: 0
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]]> 220239019 A poignant, sharp-eyed, and bitterly funny tale of a family struggling to stay together in a country that's rapidly coming apart, told through the eyes of their wondrous ten-year-old daughter, by the bestselling author of Super Sad True Love Story and Our Country Friends

"In its swirls of emotion, its humor and its pathos, the unsparing humanity of its vision, Vera, or Faith is like some fabulous, hitherto-unknown creature that’s been let out of its bottle and set free. It begins to seem that there’s nothing Gary Shteyngart can’t do."—Michael Cunningham

The Bradford-Shmulkin family is falling apart. A very modern blend of Russian, Jewish, Korean, and New England WASP, they love each other deeply but the pressures of life in an unstable America are fraying their bonds. There's Daddy, a struggling, cash-thirsty editor whose Russian heritage gives him a surprising new currency in the upside-down world of twenty-first-century geopolitics; his wife, Anne Mom, a progressive, underfunded blue blood from Boston who's barely holding the household together; their son, Dylan, whose blond hair and Mayflower lineage give him pride of place in the newly forming American political order; and, above all, the young Vera, half-Jewish, half-Korean, and wholly original.

Observant, sensitive, and always writing down new vocabulary words, Vera wants only three things in a friend at school; Daddy and Anne Mom to stay together; and to meet her birth mother, Mom Mom, who will at last tell Vera the secret of who she really is and how to ensure love's survival in this great, mad, imploding world.

Both biting and deeply moving, Vera, or Faith is a boldly imagined story of family and country told through the clear and tender eyes of a child. With a nod to What Maisie Knew, Henry James's classic story of parents, children, and the dark ironies of a rapidly transforming society, Vera, or Faith demonstrates why Shteyngart is, in the words of The New York Times, "one of his generation's most exhilarating writers."]]> 256 Gary Shteyngart 0593595092 Christian 0 to-read 4.65 2025
author: Gary Shteyngart
name: Christian
average rating: 4.65
book published: 2025
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]]> 181346414
In the summer of 1932, the Weimar Republic was on the verge of collapse. One in three Germans was unemployed. Violence was rampant. Hitler’s National Socialists surged at the polls. Paul von Hindenburg, an aging war hero and avowed monarchist, was a reluctant president bound by oath to uphold the constitution. The November elections offered Hitler the prospect of a Reichstag majority and the path to political power. But instead, the Nazis lost two million votes. As membership hemorrhaged and financial backers withdrew, the Nazi Party threatened to fracture. Hitler talked of suicide. The New York Times declared he was finished. Yet somehow, in a few brief weeks, he was chancellor of Germany.

In facinating detail and with previously un-accessed archival materials, Timothy W. Ryback tells the remarkable story of Hitler’s dismantling of democracy through democratic process. He provides fresh perspective and insights into Hitler’s personal and professional lives in these months, in all their complexity and uncertainty—backroom deals, unlikely alliances, stunning betrayals, an ill-timed tax audit, and a fateful weekend that changed our world forever. Above all, Ryback details why a wearied Hindenburg, who disdained the “Bohemian corporal,�� ultimately decided to appoint Hitler chancellor in January 1933. Within weeks, Germany was no longer a democracy.]]> 400 Timothy W. Ryback 0593537424 Christian 4 4.06
author: Timothy W. Ryback
name: Christian
average rating: 4.06
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2025/04/13
date added: 2025/04/13
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]]> 212294438 'I cannot think of a better time for a book like Shift or a better author to write it' - Angela Duckworth

In Shift, renowned neuroscientist and bestselling author Dr Ethan Kross opens up his lab to reveal the mechanics of emotions, why we have them and how we can manage them effectively. Essential tools are hidden in plain sight - in our senses, our attention and ability to shift perspective, in our relationships with other people and the physical and cultural spaces we occupy.

Through compelling stories and an exploration of the latest science in emotion research, Dr Kross shows how you can master emotional decision-making for a happier, healthier and more productive life.

'A rare double threat. His academic research is world-class... and don't we all need help regulating our emotions?' - Dan Pink]]> 288 Ethan Kross 0593444418 Christian 0 to-read 3.85
author: Ethan Kross
name: Christian
average rating: 3.85
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date added: 2025/04/10
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]]> 203357708 Do you have a burning passion to make a lot of money in business? Are you ready to turbocharge your chances of professional and personal success?



During his more than four decades as a CEO and serial entrepreneur, Brad Jacobs has created seven flagship companies across different industries, delivering tens of billions of dollars of value to shareholders. In How to Make a Few Billion Dollars, Jacobs defines the mindset that drives his remarkable success in corporate America—and distills a lifetime of business brilliance into a tactical road map.

From provocative recommendations for “rearranging your brain”—an essential prerequisite to accomplishing enormous goals—to practical advice for dealing with colleagues, Jacobs will have you rethinking what it means to win big. He explains why it’s critical to spot key trends and capitalize on them, including the biggest trend of all—the rapid evolution of technology relative to human development. And, he shares his techniques for

�� turning a healthy fear of failure to your advantage,

�� achieving lots of high-quality M&A without imploding,

�� building an outrageously talented team,

�� catalyzing electric meetings, and

�� transforming a company into a superorganism that kills the competition.

How to Make a Few Billion Dollars is an inside look at how this entrepreneurial titan leads with humility, compassion, and accountability, while running hard toward the American Dream. If your personal dream is to create wealth through free markets or to triumph in sports, the arts, politics, philanthropy, or any other part of your life, this book will help you make that a reality.]]> 206 Brad Jacobs Christian 3 4.19
author: Brad Jacobs
name: Christian
average rating: 4.19
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2025/04/06
date added: 2025/04/06
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]]> 44667853
“Simply put, Michael Dorf is a true hustler. When the internet upended the music business, he wasn’t romantic about the way things were done and like any great entrepreneur, focused on what’s happening today. It has been fun for me to watch Michael operate in this ever-changing world. There is a lot that can be learned from this man.�� �� Gary Vaynerchuk , Founder and CEO, VaynerMedia; and author, Crushing It

As founder of the iconic Knitting Factory music venue in New York, Michael Dorf became one of the earliest pioneers of digital music in the 1990s and found himself addicted to the seductive promise of the Internet. But losing everything in the dot-com bust led to a renewed appreciation for the sensory pleasures of life and inspired him to gamble big with his latest crazy Launching a wine-making facility in the middle of Manhattan for patrons who could also have dinner in a cozy three-hundred-seat venue while watching concerts by artists such as Elvis Costello, Steve Earle, Suzanne Vega, and Esperanza Spalding.

After surviving another economic cataclysm—the Great Recession of 2008—Dorf found that his City Winery concept worked beautifully and he expanded it into a national network of clubs that continues to grow rapidly. Along the way, he realized why his venues are sold out nearly every night, from Boston to Trapped in a digital bubble, increasingly separate from the real world, people are eager for the visceral, sensory experiences he offers.

In Indulge Your Scaling Intimacy in a Digital World , Dorf tells riveting tales from his wild ride through three decades of business escapades and dispenses invaluable wisdom for readers—entrepreneurs, executives, students, professionals, lovers of music and wine—who are struggling to balance the virtual and the real in a world awash in technology.

“Music, wine, food, and community—not only has Michael Dorf cracked the code on a recipe so many of us crave most in an increasingly disconnected world, he’s also managed to grow a brilliantly successful business while listening to his gut and sticking to his values. It’s a feat that all entrepreneurs would be wise to study closely.�� �� Danny Meyer , CEO, Union Square Hospitality Group; Founder, Shake Shack; and author, Setting the The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business

“The lessons learned in Michael Dorf’s fascinating career make this as much a business book about how to thrive by indulging a customer’s senses in our digital age as it is a gripping tale from an insider in the New York rock and jazz world during a period of massive technological change.”�� Steve Case , co-founder of the investment firm Revolution LLC and former CEO of AOL

“Sonic Youth, Beck, John Zorn, Cecil Taylor—Michael Dorf showcased them all at his cutting-edge Knitting Factory. Neil Young, Aaron Neville, Macy Gray, Shawn Colvin—those artists and more have graced his upscale City Winery. It’s hard to imagine anyone in New York who has presented more great live music over the past thirty years. This book is the colorful story of how Dorf pulled it off, both before and after the Internet upended the music industry and changed our lives forever. It’s inspiring reading for anybody who cares about music, culture, and wine, and explains how to thrive by offering people a live experience they will always remember.�� �� Rita Houston , WFUV Program Director]]> 224 Michael Dorf 1642932671 Christian 3 owned 3.94
author: Michael Dorf
name: Christian
average rating: 3.94
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2025/04/06
date added: 2025/04/06
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]]> 213280 This an alternate cover for 9780060742751

The bestselling business book from award-winning restauranteur Danny Meyer, of Union Square Cafe, Gramercy Tavern, and Shake Shack

Seventy-five percent of all new restaurant ventures fail, and of those that do stick around, only a few become icons. Danny Meyer started Union Square Cafe when he was 27, with a good idea and hopeful investors. He is now the co-owner of a restaurant empire. How did he do it? How did he beat the odds in one of the toughest trades around? In this landmark book, Danny shares the lessons he learned developing the dynamic philosophy he calls Enlightened Hospitality. The tenets of that philosophy, which emphasize strong in-house relationships as well as customer satisfaction, are applicable to anyone who works in any business. Whether you are a manager, an executive, or a waiter, Danny’s story and philosophy will help you become more effective and productive, while deepening your understanding and appreciation of a job well done.��

Setting the Table��is landmark a motivational work from one of our era’s most gifted and insightful business leaders.]]> 336 Danny Meyer Christian 0 to-read 3.98 2006
author: Danny Meyer
name: Christian
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/06
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]]> 214151495 From RuPaul’s Drag Race winner and host of �����’s We’re Here comes an inventive, wondrous novel about American hero Harriet Tubman that remixes history into a fresh, dynamic novel about love, freedom, salvation, and music.

In an age of miracles where our greatest heroes from history have magically, unexplainably returned to shake us out of our confusion and hate, Harriet Tubman is back, and she has a lot to say.

Harriet Tubman and four of the enslaved persons she led to freedom want to tell their story in a unique way—by following in the footsteps of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton. Harriet wants to put on a show about her life, and she needs a songwriter to help her.

She calls upon Darnell Williams, a once successful hip-hop producer who was topping the charts before being outed by a rival at the BET Awards. Darnell has no idea what to expect when he steps into the studio with Harriet, only that they have one week to write a Broadway caliber musical she can take on the road. Over the course of their time together, they not only mount a show that will take the country by storm, but confront the horrors of both their pasts, and learn to find a way to a better future.

Original, evocative, and historic, Harriet Live in Concert is a landmark achievement that will burrow deep into our hearts (and ears).]]> 240 Bob the Drag Queen 166806197X Christian 0 to-read 4.10 2025
author: Bob the Drag Queen
name: Christian
average rating: 4.10
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/04/04
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]]> 213395504 From the UK’s ‘statistical national treasure��, a clever and data-driven guide to how we can live with risk and uncertainty


Life is uncertain. We are all the result of an unforeseen and unforeseeable sequence of small occurrences. But what underlies this fragile chain of events? Is it random or just complex? And what role does luck play in our lives?

David Spiegelhalter has spent his career crunching data in order to help understand uncertainty and assess the chances of what might happen. In The Art of Uncertainty, he gives readers a window onto how we can all do this better.

Uncertainty, he argues, is a relationship between the observer and an object in the outside world. He shows us how we can express it numerically, and then update our beliefs about the future in the face of constantly changing experience. In crystal-clear prose, he takes us through the principles of probability, a field that informs everything from annuities to pandemics and climate change, while also examining the limitations of statistical modelling and arguing we need to have the humility to admit our ignorance.

Drawing on a wide range of real-world examples, this is an essential guide to navigating uncertainty in a world that makes it inevitable.]]> 336 David Spiegelhalter 1324106115 Christian 0 to-read, not-at-library 3.74
author: David Spiegelhalter
name: Christian
average rating: 3.74
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/04/01
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]]> 54365094 “An incisive and necessary�� (Roxane Gay) debut for fans of Get Out and Paul Beatty’s The Sellout, about a father’s obsessive quest to protect his son—even if it means turning him white

“You can be beautiful, even more beautiful than before.�� This is the seductive promise of Dr. Nzinga’s clinic, where anyone can get their lips thinned, their skin bleached, and their nose narrowed. A complete demelanization will liberate you from the confines of being born in a black body—if you can afford it.

In this near-future Southern city plagued by fenced-in ghettos and police violence, more and more residents are turning to this experimental medical procedure. Like any father, our narrator just wants the best for his son, Nigel, a biracial boy whose black birthmark is getting bigger by the day. The darker Nigel becomes, the more frightened his father feels. But how far will he go to protect his son? And will he destroy his family in the process?

This electrifying, hallucinatory novel is at once a keen satire of surviving racism in America and a profoundly moving family story. At its center is a father who just wants his son to thrive in a broken world. Maurice Carlos Ruffin’s work evokes the clear vision of Ralph Ellison, the dizzying menace of Franz Kafka, and the crackling prose of Vladimir Nabokov. We Cast a Shadow fearlessly shines a light on the violence we inherit, and on the desperate things we do for the ones we love.]]> 323 Maurice Carlos Ruffin 0525509089 Christian 2
My second attempt at this book and while I made it further, I just couldn’t continue. I’m having an incredibly challenging time managing the plot and sheer number of characters. I certainly don’t mind the absurdist satire (I loved The Sellout after all) but was a similar to another book i didn’t finish recently, Chain Gang All-Stars. Both just had so much pivoting and character introductions that the plot and point was lost. ]]> 3.71 2019
author: Maurice Carlos Ruffin
name: Christian
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2019
rating: 2
read at: 2025/04/01
date added: 2025/04/01
shelves:
review:
DNF at 112.

My second attempt at this book and while I made it further, I just couldn’t continue. I’m having an incredibly challenging time managing the plot and sheer number of characters. I certainly don’t mind the absurdist satire (I loved The Sellout after all) but was a similar to another book i didn’t finish recently, Chain Gang All-Stars. Both just had so much pivoting and character introductions that the plot and point was lost.
]]> 211004089
Dominic Salt and his three children are caretakers of Shearwater, a tiny island not far from Antarctica. Home to the world’s largest seed bank, Shearwater was once full of researchers. But with sea levels rising, the Salts are now its final inhabitants, packing up the seeds before they are transported to safer ground. Despite the wild beauty of life here, isolation has taken its toll on the Salts. Raff, eighteen and suffering his first heartbreak, can only find relief at his punching bag; Fen, seventeen, has started spending her nights on the beach among the seals; nine-year-old Orly, obsessed with botany, fears the loss of his beloved natural world; and Dominic can’t stop turning back toward the past, and the loss that drove the family to Shearwater in the first place.

Then, during the worst storm the island has ever seen, a woman washes up on shore. As the Salts nurse the woman, Rowan, back to life, their suspicion gives way to affection, and they finally begin to feel like a family again. Rowan, long accustomed to protecting her heart, begins to fall for the Salts, too. But Rowan isn’t telling the whole truth about why she set out for Shearwater. And when she discovers the sabotaged radios and a freshly dug grave, she realizes Dominic is keeping his own dark secrets. As the storms on Shearwater gather force, the characters must decide if they can trust each other enough to protect the precious seeds in their care before it’s too late—and if they can finally put the tragedies of the past behind them to create something new, together.]]> 303 Charlotte McConaghy 1250827957 Christian 0 to-read, owned 4.31 2025
author: Charlotte McConaghy
name: Christian
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/29
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]]> 219833252 Award-winning, New York Times bestselling author S. A. Cosby returns with King of Ashes, a Godfather-inspired Southern crime epic and dazzling family drama.

When eldest son Roman Carruthers is summoned home after his father’s car accident, he finds his younger brother, Dante, in debt to dangerous criminals and his sister, Neveah, exhausted from holding the family—and the family business—together. Neveah and their father, who run the Carruthers Crematorium in the run-down central Virginia town of Jefferson Run, see death up close every day. But mortality draws even closer when it becomes clear that the crash that landed their father in a coma was no accident and Dante’s recklessness has placed them all in real danger.

Roman, a financial whiz with a head for numbers and a talent for making his clients rich, has some money to help buy his brother out of trouble. But in his work with wannabe tough guys, he’s forgotten that there are real gangsters out there. As his bargaining chips go up in smoke, Roman realizes that he has only one thing left to offer to save his himself, and his own particular set of skills.

Roman begins his work for the criminals while Neveah tries to uncover the long-ago mystery of what happened to their mother, who disappeared when they were teenagers. But Roman is far less of a pushover than the gangsters realize. He is willing to do anything to save his family. Anything.

Because everything burns.]]> 352 S.A. Cosby 1250832063 Christian 0 to-read, owned 4.37 2025
author: S.A. Cosby
name: Christian
average rating: 4.37
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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]]> 195391724
Vercher deftly blurs the lines between real and imagined, past and present, tragedy and humor, and fathers and sons in this story of discovering and reclaiming a painful past. With the wit and rawness of Paul Beatty’s The Sellout, Devil Is Fine is a gripping, surreal, and brilliantly crafted dissection of the legacies we leave behind and those we inherit.]]> 272 John Vercher 1250894484 Christian 5
I don’t want to mention much else because reading this was such a great experience that experiencing it fresh is well worth it.]]> 3.94 2024
author: John Vercher
name: Christian
average rating: 3.94
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2025/03/28
date added: 2025/03/28
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As a father of a teenaged boy, I knew this was gonna be tough. And it was quite devastating in parts. But the way Vercher handles a half dozen other themes is remarkable. There aren’t many novels I think of re-reading but I’d read this one again because of the ways he plays with prose, leaves hints along the way, and weaves things in ways I didn’t expect.

I don’t want to mention much else because reading this was such a great experience that experiencing it fresh is well worth it.
]]> 216971226 In the second volume of the landmark American Revolution trilogy by the Pulitzer Prize-winning and #1 New York Times bestselling author of The British Are Coming, George Washington's army fights on the knife edge between victory and defeat.
The first twenty-one months of the American Revolution--which began at Lexington and ended at Princeton--was the story of a ragged group of militiamen and soldiers fighting to forge a new nation. By the winter of 1777, the exhausted Continental Army could claim only that it had escaped annihilation by the world's most formidable fighting force.

Two years into the war, George III is as determined as ever to bring his rebellious colonies to heel. But the king's task is now far more complicated: fighting a determined enemy on the other side of the Atlantic has become ruinously expensive, and spies tell him that the French and Spanish are threatening to join forces with the Americans.

Prize-winning historian Rick Atkinson provides a riveting narrative covering the middle years of the Revolution. Stationed in Paris, Benjamin Franklin woos the French; in Pennsylvania, George Washington pleads with Congress to deliver the money, men, and materiel he needs to continue the fight. In New York, General William Howe, the commander of the greatest army the British have ever sent overseas, plans a new campaign against the Americans--even as he is no longer certain that he can win this searing, bloody war. The months and years that follow bring epic battles at Brandywine, Saratoga, and Charleston, as well as a winter of misery at Valley Forge, and yet more appeals for sacrifice by every American committed to the struggle for freedom.

Timed to coincide with the 250th anniversary of the beginning of the Revolution, Atkinson's brilliant account of the lethal struggle between the Americans and the British offers not only deeply researched and spectacularly dramatic history, but also a fresh perspective on the demands that a democracy makes on each of its citizens.]]> 880 Rick Atkinson 0593799186 Christian 0 to-read 4.66 2025
author: Rick Atkinson
name: Christian
average rating: 4.66
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: to-read
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]]> 216247514 From the author of The Immortal King Rao, finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, a personal and provocative exploration of how technology companies have reshaped human language, and, if we let them, could steal it from us

When it was released to the public in November 2022, ChatGPT awakened the world to a secretive teaching A.I.-powered machines to write and talk like human beings. Its creators had a sweeping ambition—to get machines to communicate for us. But if this came to pass, would it be liberation or subjugation?��

Vauhini Vara, an award-winning tech journalist and editor, had long been grappling with this question. In 2021, she used a predecessor of ChatGPT to write about her sister’s death, resulting in an essay that was both more moving and more disturbing than she could have imagined. It quickly went viral.

The experience, revealing both the appeal and the danger of corporate-owned language machines, forced Vara to interrogate how technology has changed how she uses language, from discovering online chat rooms as a preteen, to using social media as the Wall Street Journal��s first Facebook reporter, to testing early versions of ChatGPT—all while adding to the trove of human-created material that Big Tech exploits. Interspersed throughout this investigation are her own Google searches, Amazon reviews, and the other raw material of internet life—including the viral A.I. experiment that started it all. Searches illuminates Big Tech’s incursion into our lives, while proposing that by harnessing the collective imagination that taught us to communicate in the first place, we might invent a nobler, freer relationship with our machines and, ultimately, with one another.]]> 352 Vauhini Vara 0593701526 Christian 0 to-read 4.25 2025
author: Vauhini Vara
name: Christian
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2025/03/28
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]]> 213395554 A family saga following four generations on a time-bending journey from coastal Scotland to a colony on Mars.

Hannah is a fusion scientist working in a cottage off the coast of Scotland when she’s approached by a visitor from the future, a young man from a human settlement on Mars, traveling backward through time to intervene in the fate of a warming planet.

Roban lives in the Colony, a sterile outpost of civilization, where he longs for the wonders of a home planet he never knew. Between Hannah and Roban, two generations, a father and a daughter, face down an uncertain future. Andrew believes there is still time for the human spirit to triumph. For his rationalist daughter Kenzie, such idealism is not enough to keep the rising floods at bay, so she signs on to work for a company that would abandon Earth for the promise of a world beyond.

In exploring the question “What if you could come back to the past and somehow change it with technology?�� Joe Mungo Reed has written an immersive story of hope, hubris, and sacrifice in the face of a frighteningly precarious present.]]> 256 Joe Mungo Reed 1324079371 Christian 0 to-read 4.29 2025
author: Joe Mungo Reed
name: Christian
average rating: 4.29
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: to-read
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]]> 220259184 Heartwood takes you on a journey as a search and rescue team race against time when an experienced hiker mysteriously disappears on the Appalachian Trail in Maine.

In the heart of the Maine woods, an experienced Appalachian Trail hiker goes missing. She is forty-two-year-old Valerie Gillis, who has vanished 200 miles from her final destination. Alone in the wilderness, Valerie pours her thoughts into fractured, poetic letters to her mother as she battles the elements and struggles to keep hoping.

At the heart of the investigation is Beverly, the determined Maine State Game Warden tasked with finding Valerie, who leads the search on the ground. Meanwhile, Lena, a seventy-six-year-old birdwatcher in a Connecticut retirement community, becomes an unexpected armchair detective. Roving between these compelling narratives, a puzzle emerges, intensifying the frantic search, as Valerie’s disappearance may not be accidental.]]> 320 Amity Gaige 1668063603 Christian 0 to-read 4.02 2025
author: Amity Gaige
name: Christian
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/28
shelves: to-read
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]]> 28443666

A double-edged and satisfying story with a strong female protagonist, a thrilling plot, and a creeping sense of the apocalyptic, Sweet Lamb of Heaven builds to a shattering ending with profound implications for its characters—and for all of us.]]> 256 Lydia Millet 0393285553 Christian 4
After discover Millet a few years ago I wanted to work backwards through her works and this one certainly felt rougher than her next two novels. At some point I had to just skim chapters that felt hollow. But then she’d insert some super critical plot point and draw you back in.

I think there will be multiple “correct�� ways to interpret this novel and I think that’s why I love these uncategorizable books. To me it is a story of psychological abuse and how hard it is to pin down in a relationship. There’s this specter of what Ned could do but he never actually does anything violent to make her escape. And the main character can’t quite articulate her own feelings of fear and often feels as if she’s hallucinating. That form of gaslighting and intentionally creating self-doubt is a common type of abuse but it’s hard to write about for its lack of direct action. Millet describes it well and shows the stress a controlling and pathological partner can cause without physical harm.]]> 3.25 2016
author: Lydia Millet
name: Christian
average rating: 3.25
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at: 2024/07/31
date added: 2025/03/26
shelves:
review:
Really hard to articulate how I feel about this book, or whether I even like it. I can’t even imagine the challenge in marketing this story. Suspense? Horror? Cli-fi? I don’t really know and I think that’s why I enjoyed it. She took a story of a woman fleeing a threatening husband to save herself and her daughter and made it into several genres. It’s a bit like a Jordan Peele movie in book form.

After discover Millet a few years ago I wanted to work backwards through her works and this one certainly felt rougher than her next two novels. At some point I had to just skim chapters that felt hollow. But then she’d insert some super critical plot point and draw you back in.

I think there will be multiple “correct�� ways to interpret this novel and I think that’s why I love these uncategorizable books. To me it is a story of psychological abuse and how hard it is to pin down in a relationship. There’s this specter of what Ned could do but he never actually does anything violent to make her escape. And the main character can’t quite articulate her own feelings of fear and often feels as if she’s hallucinating. That form of gaslighting and intentionally creating self-doubt is a common type of abuse but it’s hard to write about for its lack of direct action. Millet describes it well and shows the stress a controlling and pathological partner can cause without physical harm.
]]> 59808430 Alternative cover edition of ISBN 9781644452080

A sly, madcap novel about supervillains and nothing, really, from an American novelist whose star keeps rising

The protagonist of Percival Everett’s puckish new novel is a brilliant professor of mathematics who goes by Wala Kitu. (Wala, he explains, means “nothing�� in Tagalog, and Kitu is Swahili for “nothing.��) He is an expert on nothing. That is to say, he is an expert, and his area of study is nothing, and he does nothing about it. This makes him the perfect partner for the aspiring villain John Sill, who wants to break into Fort Knox to steal, well, not gold bars but a shoebox containing nothing. Once he controls nothing he’ll proceed with a dastardly plan to turn a Massachusetts town into nothing. Or so he thinks.

With the help of the brainy and brainwashed astrophysicist-turned-henchwoman Eigen Vector, our professor tries to foil the villain while remaining in his employ. In the process, Wala Kitu learns that Sill’s desire to become a literal Bond villain originated in some real all-American villainy related to the murder of Martin Luther King Jr. As Sill says, “Professor, think of it this way. This country has never given anything to us and it never will. We have given everything to it. I think it’s time we gave nothing back.��

Dr. No is a caper with teeth, a wildly mischievous novel from one of our most inventive, provocative, and productive writers. That it is about nothing isn’t to say that it’s not about anything. In fact, it’s about villains. Bond villains. And that’s not nothing.]]> 262 Percival Everett Christian 3 3.67 2022
author: Percival Everett
name: Christian
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2022
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/25
date added: 2025/03/25
shelves:
review:
Nobody writes with quite the style as Everett does and I’ve come to enjoy it. This one was a little less interesting to me because it lacked a deeper thread that I feel like he excels at.
]]> 215362651 “The story of relationships built and broken, mistakes inherited and repeated, and the beauty of trying again��.already one of the year’s best.”��People

Cece is in love. She has arrived early at her future in-laws�� lake house in Salish, Montana, to finish planning her wedding to Charlie, a young doctor with a brilliant life ahead of him. Charlie has asked Garrett, his best friend from college, to officiate the ceremony, though Cece can’t imagine anyone more ill-suited for the task—an airport baggage handler haunted by a tragedy from his and Charlie’s shared past. But as Cece spends time with Garrett, his gruff mask slips, and she grows increasingly uncertain about her future. And why does Garrett, after meeting Cece, begin to feel, well, human again? As a contagious stomach flu threatens to scuttle the wedding, and Charlie and Garrett’s friendship is put to the ultimate test, Cece must decide between the life she’s dreamed of and a life she’s never imagined.

The events of that summer have long-lasting repercussions, not only on the three friends caught in its shadow but also on their children, who struggle to escape their parents�� story. Spanning fifty years and set against the backdrop of a rapidly warming Montana, Dream State explores what it means to live with the mistakes of the past—both our own and the ones we’ve inherited.

Written with humor, precision, and enormous heart, both a love letter and an elegy to the American West, Dream State is a thrillingly ambitious ode to the power of friendship, the weird weather of marriage, and the beauty of impermanence.]]> 448 Eric Puchner 0385550669 Christian 0 to-read 3.63 2025
author: Eric Puchner
name: Christian
average rating: 3.63
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/23
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 199798259
Sylvia Knight is losing hope that the person who killed her husband will ever face justice. Since the night of the hit-and-run, her world has been shrouded in hazy darkness—until she meets Theo St. John, the discoverer of a rare comet soon to be visible to the naked eye.

As the comet begins to brighten, Sylvia wonders what the apparition might signify. She is soon drawn into the orbit of local mystic Joseph Evans, who believes the comet’s arrival is nothing short of a divine message. Finding herself caught between two conflicting perspectives of this celestial phenomenon, she struggles to define for herself where the reality lies. As the comet grows in the sky, her town slowly descends further and further into a fervor over its impending apex, and Sylvia’s quest to uncover her husband’s killer will push her and those around her to the furthest reaches of their very lives.

A novel about the search for meaning in a bewildering world, the loyalty of love, and the dangerous lengths people go to in pursuit of obsession, Bright Objects is a luminous, masterfully crafted literary thriller.]]> 352 Ruby Todd 1668053217 Christian 2 did-not-finish
What I simply didn’t like were the characters and their descriptions. They lacked agency and direction. I kept reading for the writing style but eventually I just couldn’t muster any interest in the story itself. ]]> 3.46 2024
author: Ruby Todd
name: Christian
average rating: 3.46
book published: 2024
rating: 2
read at: 2025/03/23
date added: 2025/03/23
shelves: did-not-finish
review:
Didn’t finish at pg 90. This author is talented, for sure. Her lyrical prose is beautiful and the setting for this novel is thoroughly researched. I also appreciated the slow pace that a lot of people complained about.

What I simply didn’t like were the characters and their descriptions. They lacked agency and direction. I kept reading for the writing style but eventually I just couldn’t muster any interest in the story itself.
]]> 214175077 An extraordinary and urgent debut by a prize-winning Irish writer, Nesting introduces an unforgettable new voice in fiction.

On a bright spring afternoon in Dublin, Ciara Fay makes a split-second decision that will change everything. Grabbing an armful of clothes from the washing line, Ciara straps her two young daughters into her car and drives away. Head spinning, all she knows for certain is that home is no longer safe.

This was meant to be an escape. But with dwindling savings, no job, and her family across the sea, Ciara finds herself adrift, facing a broken housing system and the voice of her own demons. As summer passes and winter closes in, she must navigate raising her children in a hotel room, searching for a new home and dealing with her husband Ryan’s relentless campaign to get her to come back. Because leaving is one thing, but staying away is another.

What will it take for Ciara to rebuild her life? Can she ever truly break away from Ryan’s control �� and what will be the cost?

Tense, beautiful, and underpinned by an unassailable love, hope and resilience, this is the story of one woman’s bid to start over.]]> 400 Roisín O’Donnell 1643755706 Christian 0 to-read 4.30 2025
author: Roisín O’Donnell
name: Christian
average rating: 4.30
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/23
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 214537790 From��Pulitzer finalist, MacArthur Fellowship recipient, and bestselling��author of Swamplandia! and Vampires in the Lemon Grove. A gripping Dust Bowl epic about five characters whose fates become entangled after a storm ravages their small Nebraskan town

The Antidote opens on Black Sunday, as a historic dust storm ravages the fictional town of Uz, Nebraska. But Uz is already collapsing—not just under the weight of the Great Depression and the Dust Bowl drought, but beneath its own violent histories. The Antidote follows a "Prairie Witch," whose body serves as a bank vault for peoples�� memories and secrets; a Polish wheat farmer who learns how quickly a hoarded blessing can become a curse; his orphan niece, a basketball star and witch’s apprentice in furious flight from her grief; a voluble scarecrow; and a New Deal photographer whose time-traveling camera threatens to reveal both the town’s secrets and its fate.

Russell's novel is above all a reckoning with a nation’s forgetting—enacting the settler amnesia and willful omissions passed down from generation to generation, and unearthing not only horrors but shimmering possibilities. The Antidote echoes with urgent warnings for our own climate emergency, challenging readers with a vision of what might have been—and what still could be.]]> 432 Karen Russell 059380225X Christian 0 to-read 4.02 2025
author: Karen Russell
name: Christian
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 217006044 In his first new novel since winning the 2021 Nobel Prize, a master storyteller captures a time of dizzying global change.

At the turn of the twenty-first century, three young people come of age in Tanzania. Karim returns to his sleepy hometown after university with new swagger and ambition. Fauzia glimpses in him a chance at escape from a smothering upbringing. The two of them offer a haven to Badar, a poor boy still unsure if the future holds anything for him at all. As tourism, technology, and unexpected opportunities and perils reach their quiet corner of the world, bringing, each arrives at a different understanding of what it means to take your fate into your own hands.

]]> 296 Abdulrazak Gurnah 0593852605 Christian 0 to-read 3.96 2025
author: Abdulrazak Gurnah
name: Christian
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 214152372 A rollicking adventure starring three free-spirited Victorians on a twenty-year quest to decipher cuneiform, the oldest writing in the world��from the New York Times bestselling author of The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu.

It was one of history’s great vanishing acts.

Around 3,400 BCE—as humans were gathering in complex urban settlements—a scribe in the mud-walled city-state of Uruk picked up a reed stylus to press tiny symbols into clay. For three millennia, wedge shape cuneiform script would record the military conquests, scientific discoveries, and epic literature of the great Mesopotamian kingdoms of Sumer, Assyria, and Babylon and of Persia’s mighty Achaemenid Empire, along with precious minutiae about everyday life in the cradle of civilization. And then…the meaning of the characters was lost.

London, 1857. In an era obsessed with human progress, mysterious palaces emerging from the desert sands had captured the Victorian public’s imagination. Yet Europe’s best philologists struggled to decipher the bizarre inscriptions excavators were digging up.

Enter a swashbuckling archaeologist, a suave British military officer turned diplomat, and a cloistered Irish rector, all vying for glory in a race to decipher this script that would enable them to peek farther back into human history than ever before.

From the ruins of Persepolis to lawless outposts of the crumbling Ottoman Empire, The Mesopotamian Riddle whisks you on a wild adventure through the golden age of archaeology in an epic quest to understand our past.]]> 400 Joshua Hammer 1668015447 Christian 0 to-read 4.11 2025
author: Joshua Hammer
name: Christian
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 206549834 Two brothers in dire straits, living on the edge of Yellowstone, agree to a desperate act of survival.

In an aging timber house hand-built into the Absaroka-Beartooth mountains, two brothers are struggling to keep up with their debts. They live off the grid on the fringe of Yellowstone, surviving after the death of their father. Thad, the elder, is more capable of engaging with things like the truck registration and the medical bills from their father’s fatal illness and the tax lien on the cabin their grandfather built, while Hazen is... different, more instinctual, deeply attuned to the natural world. Desperate for money, they are approached by a shadowy out-of-towner with a proposition and agree to attempt a heist of natural resources from Yellowstone, a federal crime. Beartooth is a fast-paced tale set in the grandeur of the American West.]]> 256 Callan Wink 1954118023 Christian 0 to-read 3.71 2025
author: Callan Wink
name: Christian
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/22
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 214363785 " this book will make you a better parent, partner, colleague, and friend..."��—Adam Grant,��NYT��bestselling author��

"As an engineer, I appreciate when complex human dynamics can be broken down into practical, actionable steps. Dr. Fleck has done exactly that with validation—a skill that, when mastered, becomes nothing short of a superpower..." —Mark Rober, founder of CrunchLabs

"Dr. Caroline Fleck reminds us that being present, listening, suspending judgment, and really hearing someone is the greatest gift we can give or receive. There is such magic in validation, and Dr. Fleck shines a light on something that can enliven our sense of possibility and self." —Dr. Ramani Durvasula,��NYT��bestselling author
��
"Validation is a vital skill for fostering real connections and inner resilience. For the first time, we have a clear and practical self-help guide for bringing this often underdeveloped skill into your everyday life... Highly recommended."—Steven C. Hayes, originator of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy
��
Unlock the secret to true and lasting change.

We all��spend��a lot��of energy trying to get��people��to listen to us, and despite our best efforts, we often fail. But what if the secret to��influencing others��was to demonstrate acceptance?

Enter validation �� communication that one accepts and sees the validity in another person's experience.�� Research on validation shows that it has profound effects, from improving relationships and de-escalating conflicts to increasing one's influence and self-compassion. In this groundbreaking book, clinical psychologist Caroline Fleck explores how validation's unique ability to demonstrate acceptance while fostering change makes it one of psychotherapy's best-kept secrets. More importantly, she takes us step-by-step through��eight skills we can use to communicate validation and experience its power firsthand.

Full of captivating stories, laugh-out-loud moments, and��actionable takeaways,��Validation��reveals how the science of seeing and being seen is the key to inner and interpersonal transformation.]]> 274 Caroline Fleck 139871318X Christian 3 4.20
author: Caroline Fleck
name: Christian
average rating: 4.20
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/22
date added: 2025/03/22
shelves:
review:
It’s fine. It’s a lot more self-help oriented than I expected. So if you like that type of book (guidelines, how-tos), then you’ll like this book. For me I’ve historically retained these types of books pretty poorly. I also personally didn’t find much of this interesting to me personally. It’s possible that’s because I’ve basically had to relate to people for my job for the past decade and subsequently had a ton of training and experience. So in that way I can offer that I can vouch for everything she says in this book.
]]> 199698485 When a teenager vanishes from her Adirondack summer camp, two worlds collide

Early morning, August 1975: a camp counselor discovers an empty bunk. Its occupant, Barbara Van Laar, has gone missing. Barbara isn’t just any thirteen-year-old: she’s the daughter of the family that owns the summer camp and employs most of the region’s residents. And this isn’t the first time a Van Laar child has disappeared. Barbara’s older brother similarly vanished fourteen years ago, never to be found.

As a panicked search begins, a thrilling drama unfolds. Chasing down the layered secrets of the Van Laar family and the blue-collar community working in its shadow, Moore’s multi-threaded story invites readers into a rich and gripping dynasty of secrets and second chances. It is Liz Moore’s most ambitious and wide-reaching novel yet.]]> 490 Liz Moore Christian 0 to-read 4.16 2024
author: Liz Moore
name: Christian
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/03/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 198332459 350 Abigail Shrier Christian 3
I think her starting point is a really solid argument and one I hope to see explored by science. In short, therapy isn’t beholden to the same rigor as medicine and particularly with children, it can create more issues than solve. It’s easy to take the extreme position after reading this book, which is to say that therapy is categorically bad for children. I wouldn’t blame someone for this take given how skewed the book is. But I don’t think Shrier is actually proposing that fwiw.

The book starts getting a bit rougher in part 2 when she just keeps narrowing her examples to the most extremes without any sense of balance. She rips apart social-emotional learning (probably justifiably so), but writes about insanely extreme examples of schools applying these programs incorrectly. It’s enough to make your head spin until you remember of the tens of thousands of schools, she probably focuses on 20 of them to bolster her case. For example, she mentions how inappropriate it is for schools to meddle in kids�� personal lives, with many schools employing counselors. She tells some horror stories that make it easy to want to banish all counselors. But in my own experience, I have seen the benefit of counselors with my own children and so have many parents in my circle.

I’ve spent most of this review criticizing this book but overall I personally enjoyed it and am glad it was written. I think the challenge is this has to be read with skepticism and common sense. I personally have found what I needed to frame how and when I want my own kids in therapy and how to better guide them towards resilience. ]]> 3.98 2024
author: Abigail Shrier
name: Christian
average rating: 3.98
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/03/08
date added: 2025/03/08
shelves:
review:
You have to take this book for what it is: a book written by a journalist with a distinct opinion, with cherry-picked evidence to support her opinions, and scientific only through interviews with scientists. This is why I avoid journalist books written about sociological or scientific topics but in this case I needed to see that someone was noticing the same things I was about therapy for children.

I think her starting point is a really solid argument and one I hope to see explored by science. In short, therapy isn’t beholden to the same rigor as medicine and particularly with children, it can create more issues than solve. It’s easy to take the extreme position after reading this book, which is to say that therapy is categorically bad for children. I wouldn’t blame someone for this take given how skewed the book is. But I don’t think Shrier is actually proposing that fwiw.

The book starts getting a bit rougher in part 2 when she just keeps narrowing her examples to the most extremes without any sense of balance. She rips apart social-emotional learning (probably justifiably so), but writes about insanely extreme examples of schools applying these programs incorrectly. It’s enough to make your head spin until you remember of the tens of thousands of schools, she probably focuses on 20 of them to bolster her case. For example, she mentions how inappropriate it is for schools to meddle in kids�� personal lives, with many schools employing counselors. She tells some horror stories that make it easy to want to banish all counselors. But in my own experience, I have seen the benefit of counselors with my own children and so have many parents in my circle.

I’ve spent most of this review criticizing this book but overall I personally enjoyed it and am glad it was written. I think the challenge is this has to be read with skepticism and common sense. I personally have found what I needed to frame how and when I want my own kids in therapy and how to better guide them towards resilience.
]]> 199348906 Andrew Wilkinson, touted as the Warren Buffett of tech, pulls back the curtain on the lives of the ultra-rich in this memoir outlining Wilkinson’s rapid rise from barista to successful entrepreneur.

Readers will get fresh insights into building a successful business and a surprising, first-person account of what it’s actually like to become a billionaire.

By the age of thirty-five, Andrew Wilkinson had built a business worth over a billion dollars, but his path to success was anything but a straight line. Never Enough shares both the lessons Wilkinson has learned as well as the many mistakes made on the road to wealth—some of which cost him money, happiness, and important relationships.

Taking a “no secrets�� approach to the story billionaires rarely tell, Wilkinson is unwaveringly honest about some of the unexpected downsides of wealth. Money’s toxic effect on personal relationships, how the lifestyles of the rich and famous aren’t all they’re cracked up to be, and how competition with peers leaves everyone—even billionaires—feeling like they never have enough.

In this rare and deeply honest glimpse into the life of a billionaire, Wilkinson examines not only his journey to nine zeros but also what comes after that pinnacled number—something, as Wilkinson has come to realize, that money can’t buy.]]> 288 Andrew Wilkinson 1637744765 Christian 0 to-read 4.36
author: Andrew Wilkinson
name: Christian
average rating: 4.36
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/02/25
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 28280395 Are you running a highly successful company that just doesn’t seem to be growing? You may be so operationally focused that you’ve ignored one of the most important aspects of an expanding business―working from a market-based perspective. In The Growth Gears, Art Saxby and Pete Hayes share their linear method of transforming into a market-focused organization.
This book provides a simple framework as well as tools and action steps for identifying and adding these “gears�� to give your company a set of repeatable behaviors and processes to fully capitalize on your market potential. Pete and Art bring their years of executive marketing experience, and their years of building a national management consulting firm, to lead you from insight to strategy to execution. In these pages, you will learn how �� Determine if your business is operationally oriented or market oriented �� Identify opportunities for business growth �� Understand why marketing execution is sometimes not effective �� Assure ongoing market relevance �� Increase the returns on your marketing programs
Align your organization and your employees behind your market-focused initiatives to lead your organization to new levels of growth!]]> 228 Art Saxby 1599325896 Christian 3 owned 4.08
author: Art Saxby
name: Christian
average rating: 4.08
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/23
date added: 2025/02/23
shelves: owned
review:

]]> 214175247 An unforgettable portrait of an extraordinary life—one forged through a poverty-stricken childhood in “slummy, one-horse towns��; obsessive desire; bursts of comedy; and indispensable friendships, reflecting on the way art, music, and a deep connection to nature helped her on a singular journey��to become a beloved, Grammy-nominated artist.

Neko Case has long been revered as one of music’s most influential artists, whose authenticity, lyrical storytelling, and sly wit have endeared her to a legion of critics, musicians, and lifelong fans.��In��The Harder I Fight, the More I Love You,��Case��brings her trademark��candor and��precision��to a memoir that traces her evolution from an invisible��girl “raised by two dogs and a space heater�� in rural Washington state to��her improbable emergence as an internationally-acclaimed talent. In luminous, sharp-edged prose, Case��shows readers what it’s like to be left alone for hours and hours as a child, to take refuge in the woods around her home, and to channel the��monotony and loneliness and joy that comes from music, camaraderie, and shared experience into art.

The Harder I Fight, the More I Love You��is a rebellious meditation on identity and corruption, and a manifesto on how to make space for ourselves in this world, despite the obstacles we face.


��]]> 288 Neko Case 1538710501 Christian 5 4.09 2025
author: Neko Case
name: Christian
average rating: 4.09
book published: 2025
rating: 5
read at: 2025/02/23
date added: 2025/02/23
shelves:
review:
She is a phenomenal writer. I copied down several passages that are beautiful, poignant reflections on the human experience. What she endured and thrived in spite of is nothing short of remarkable. But the perspective and grace she can offer the rest of us is a gift.
]]> 49947205
Do tough times create tougher people? Can humanity handle the power of its weapons without destroying itself? Will human technology or capabilities ever peak or regress? No one knows the answers to such questions, but no one asks them in a more interesting way than Dan Carlin.

In The End is Always Near, Dan Carlin looks at questions and historical events that force us to consider what sounds like fantasy; that we might suffer the same fate that all previous eras did. Will our world ever become a ruin for future archaeologists to dig up and explore? The questions themselves are both philosophical and like something out of The Twilight Zone.

Combining his trademark mix of storytelling, history and weirdness Dan Carlin connects the past and future in fascinating and colorful ways. At the same time the questions he asks us to consider involve the most important issue imaginable: human survival. From the collapse of the Bronze Age to the challenges of the nuclear era the issue has hung over humanity like a persistent Sword of Damocles.

Inspired by his podcast, The End is Always Near challenges the way we look at the past and ourselves. In this absorbing compendium, Carlin embarks on a whole new set of stories and major cliffhangers that will keep readers enthralled. Idiosyncratic and erudite, offbeat yet profound, The End is Always Near examines issues that are rarely presented, and makes the past immediately relevant to our very turbulent present.]]> 288 Dan Carlin 0008340927 Christian 3 3.89 2019
author: Dan Carlin
name: Christian
average rating: 3.89
book published: 2019
rating: 3
read at: 2025/02/21
date added: 2025/02/21
shelves:
review:

]]> 126917757 384 Douglas Preston 1250909767 Christian 4 4.34 2024
author: Douglas Preston
name: Christian
average rating: 4.34
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2025/02/15
date added: 2025/02/15
shelves:
review:

]]> 16280866
Bernstein explains how new communication technologies and in particular our access to them, impacted human society. Writing was born thousands of years ago in Mesopotamia. Spreading to Sumer, and then Egypt, this revolutionary tool allowed rulers to extend their control far and wide, giving rise to the world’s first empires. When Phoenician traders took their alphabet to Greece, literacy’s first boom led to the birth of drama and democracy. In Rome, it helped spell the downfall of the Republic. Later, medieval scriptoria and vernacular bibles gave rise to religious dissent, and with the combination of cheaper paper and Gutenberg’s printing press, the fuse of Reformation was lit.

The Industrial Revolution brought the telegraph and the steam driven printing press, allowing information to move faster than ever before and to reach an even larger audience. But along with radio and television, these new technologies were more easily exploited by the powerful, as seen in Germany, the Soviet Union, even Rwanda, where radio incited genocide. With the rise of carbon duplicates (Russian samizdat), photocopying (the Pentagon Papers), the internet, social media and cell phones (the recent Arab Spring) more people have access to communications, making the world more connected than ever before.

In Masters of the Word , Bernstein masterfully guides the reader through the vast history of communications, illustrating each step with colorful stories and anecdotes. This is a captivating, enlightening book, one that will change the way you look at technology, history, and power.]]> 448 William J. Bernstein 0802121381 Christian 2 owned 3.82 2013
author: William J. Bernstein
name: Christian
average rating: 3.82
book published: 2013
rating: 2
read at: 2025/02/05
date added: 2025/02/05
shelves: owned
review:
Incredibly boring slog to get through. It suffered by being incredibly broad in scope by covering over 2,000 years. It’s hard to write books that broad but this one also contained incredible detail about handpicked events to the point that the whole thread of technology and media was repeatedly lost. I’d read ten straight pages not having a clue where I was. It’s not a bad book, hence spared a 1-star review. But I can’t recommend this to anyone.
]]> 61273342 In a near-future northern settlement, a handful of climate change survivors find their fates intertwined in this mesmerizing and transportive novel in the vein of Station Eleven and The Power.

In the far north of Canada sits Camp Zero, an American building project hiding many secrets.

Desperate to help her climate-displaced Korean immigrant mother, Rose agrees to travel to Camp Zero and spy on its architect in exchange for housing. She arrives at the same time as another newcomer, a college professor named Grant who is determined to flee his wealthy family’s dark legacy. Gradually, they realize that there is more to the architect than previously thought, and a disturbing mystery lurks beneath the surface of the camp. At the same time, rumors abound of an elite group of women soldiers living and working at a nearby Cold War-era climate research station. What are they doing there? And who is leading them?

An electrifying page-turner where nothing is as it seems, Camp Zero cleverly explores how the intersection of gender, class, and migration will impact who and what will survive in a warming world.]]> 304 Michelle Min Sterling 1668007568 Christian 2 owned, did-not-finish 3.18 2023
author: Michelle Min Sterling
name: Christian
average rating: 3.18
book published: 2023
rating: 2
read at: 2025/01/25
date added: 2025/01/25
shelves: owned, did-not-finish
review:

]]> 204640531 A leading social scientist explains the psychology of our current social divide and how understanding it can help reduce the conflicts it causes. There has been much written about the impact of polarization on elections, political parties, and policy outcomes. But Keith Payne’s goal is more to focus on what our divisions mean for us as individuals, as families, and as communities. This book is about how ordinary people think about politics, why talking about it is so hard, and how we can begin to mend the personal bonds that are fraying for so many of us. Drawing upon his own research and his experience growing up in a working class, conservative Christian family in small town Kentucky, Payne argues that there is a near-universal human tendency to believe that people who are different from us are irrational or foolish. The fundamental source of our division is our need to flexibly rationalize ideas in order to see ourselves as good people.��Understanding the psychology behind our political divide provides clues about how we can reduce the damage it is causing. It won’t allow us to undo our polarization overnight, but it can give us the tools to stop going around in circles in frustrating arguments. It can help us make better choices about how we engage in political debates, how policy makers and social media companies deal with misinformation, and how we deal with each other on social media. It can help us separate, if we choose to, our political principles from our personal relationships so that we can nurture both.]]> 272 Keith Payne 0593491947 Christian 5
Payne masterfully covers the sociological perspective on how identity becomes this means of justifying our beliefs so that we can avoid ever believing we aren’t good, reasonable people. This isn’t an effect that permeates all facets of our lives; only those parts where we have strong identity. And with politics, Americans�� identities have increasingly been tied with politics.

His personal story provides a backdrop that I think many Americans faced over the past fifty years: leaving a rural area and feeling a bit alien when they come home. His personal journey helps provide insight into how identity works and what friends and families will do protect their “psychological immune systems�� in the face of conflicting information. Rather than correcting our core identity’s beliefs to square with the data, we find other rationalizations to explain the data that keep our identity in tact.

The final takeaway is expected but still important because of how he gets us there: talk to people, connect with them, and understand their context for their beliefs rather than judging them. Personally I’ve been trying to do this in many phases of my life in the past couple years and it feels much better than the path of alienation I was on previously.

My only wish was that he covered WHY our identities are becoming more tied into political groups. I think that’s a bit of a miss on his part but would probably venture into a book unto itself.]]> 4.03
author: Keith Payne
name: Christian
average rating: 4.03
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2025/01/19
date added: 2025/01/19
shelves:
review:
I’ve been hoping for someone to write this book for the last four years. I’ve struggled mightily trying to square my own beliefs with the political shifts of the past decade. I’ve struggled to rationalize the beliefs of the right while also not buying into the left’s continual demonization of these same people when I don’t see that when I interact with people.

Payne masterfully covers the sociological perspective on how identity becomes this means of justifying our beliefs so that we can avoid ever believing we aren’t good, reasonable people. This isn’t an effect that permeates all facets of our lives; only those parts where we have strong identity. And with politics, Americans�� identities have increasingly been tied with politics.

His personal story provides a backdrop that I think many Americans faced over the past fifty years: leaving a rural area and feeling a bit alien when they come home. His personal journey helps provide insight into how identity works and what friends and families will do protect their “psychological immune systems�� in the face of conflicting information. Rather than correcting our core identity’s beliefs to square with the data, we find other rationalizations to explain the data that keep our identity in tact.

The final takeaway is expected but still important because of how he gets us there: talk to people, connect with them, and understand their context for their beliefs rather than judging them. Personally I’ve been trying to do this in many phases of my life in the past couple years and it feels much better than the path of alienation I was on previously.

My only wish was that he covered WHY our identities are becoming more tied into political groups. I think that’s a bit of a miss on his part but would probably venture into a book unto itself.
]]> 105735152
Sutton and Rao kick off the book by unpacking how skilled friction fixers think and act like trustees of others�� time. They provide friction forensics to help readers identify where to avert and repair bad organizational friction and where to maintain and inject good friction. Then their help pyramid shows how friction fixers do their work, which ranges from reframing friction troubles they can’t fix right now so they feel less threatening to designing and repairing organizations. The heart of the book digs into the causes and solutions for five of the most common and damaging friction oblivious leaders, addition sickness, broken connections, jargon monoxide, and fast and frenzied people and teams.

Sound familiar? Sutton and Rao are here to help. They wrap things up with lessons for leading your own friction project, including linking little things to big things; the power of civility, caring, and love for propelling designs and repairs; and embracing the mess that is an inevitable part of the process (while still trying to clean it up).]]> 293 Robert I. Sutton 1250284414 Christian 3
Personally I’m not in a point in my career where this is completely relatable but I still found a few concepts enlightening. The most impactful one for me is the idea of being a trustee of other people’s time. This is so simple yet powerful. I think by having it as a core principle as a leader, you could screw up a lot of things but if you nail not wasting others�� times, you’ll do well.]]> 3.76 2024
author: Robert I. Sutton
name: Christian
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2025/01/15
date added: 2025/01/15
shelves:
review:
I think a lot of people that are professional designers or work with or on engineering teams will find a lot of this book pretty obvious. But for those working in large organizations, I think this will be far more valuable.

Personally I’m not in a point in my career where this is completely relatable but I still found a few concepts enlightening. The most impactful one for me is the idea of being a trustee of other people’s time. This is so simple yet powerful. I think by having it as a core principle as a leader, you could screw up a lot of things but if you nail not wasting others�� times, you’ll do well.
]]> 53588649
Discover the life guide that has developed world champions, empowered athletes to become world #1, and most importantly, transformed their hearts and minds. This step-by-step training manual from one of the world's top mental skills coaches will teach you how the mindset of some of the best performers and leaders on the planet allowed them to have freedom and confidence when so much was out of their control.

Whether you’re an athlete or entrepreneur, single mother or father of five, you’ll find exercises, techniques and tools in this book that will improve every area of your life. Your life will take on new meaning as you move beyond the pursuit of happiness to a life of purpose and fulfillment. Jim Murphy's complete program of proven mental techniques is based on the powerful principles of love, wisdom, and courage, that came from over six years of full-time research and writing (after his masters degree in Coaching Science).

“I read the first version of Inner Excellence six times. I recommend all my clients read it.�� �� Matt Killen, PGA Tour coach to Justin Thomas, Tiger Woods and many others

INNER EXCELLENCE WILL SHOW YOU HOW TO:

DEVELOP SELF-MASTERY—and let go of what you can’t control
OVERCOME ANXIETY—and build powerful mental habits
REMOVE MENTAL BLOCKS—and get out of your own way
TRAIN YOUR SUBCONSCIOUS MIND—and release limiting beliefs

As professional baseball player in the Chicago Cubs organization, Jim’s sense of worth and identity revolved around his performance. He was obsessed with fame but also afraid of failure, and that fear in his heart made him struggle under the pressure to perform. When he started coaching professional and Olympic athletes, he saw the same pattern over and over again: athletes had lost their joy and passion for life as the fear of failure engulfed their lives.

This book will share with you how some of the best athletes in the world have learned Inner Excellence, how it propelled them to extraordinary performance even when they were filled with doubt and uncertainty, and how you can excel in the same way in your life. The insights and exercises within will help you achieve higher levels of performance than you ever thought possible—and bring incredible peace and confidence.

“Inner Excellence changed how I see the world, how I think, and how I play golf.�� - Vaughn Taylor, three-time PGA Tour winner

Jim Murphy is a Performance Coach (mental skills) to some of the best athletes and leaders in the world. The majority of his clients achieved the best year of their career their first year working with Jim (or their best year in the previous five years)]]> 362 Jim Murphy 1734654821 Christian 0 to-read 4.30 2009
author: Jim Murphy
name: Christian
average rating: 4.30
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2025/01/12
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 52778478
Don't miss the Spike Lee film of the Broadway hit American Utopia --on HBO.
A Beat Most Anticipated Graphic Novel of Fall 2020

A joyful collaboration between old friends David Byrne and Maira Kalman, American Utopia offers readers an antidote to cynicism, bursting with pathos, humanism, and hope--featuring his words and lyrics brought to life with more than 150 of her colorful paintings.

The text is drawn from David Byrne's American Utopia , which has become a hit Broadway show and is now a film from Spike Lee on HBO. The four-color artwork, by Maira Kalman, which she created for the Broadway show's curtain, is composed of small moments, expressions, gestures, and interactions that together offer a portrait of daily life and coexistence.

With their creative talents combined, American Utopia is a salvo for kindness and a call for jubilation, a reminder to sing, dance, and waste not a moment. Beautifully designed and edited by Alex Kalman, American Utopia is a balm for the soul from two of the world's most extraordinary artists.]]> 160 David Byrne 1635576687 Christian 3 owned 3.48 2020
author: David Byrne
name: Christian
average rating: 3.48
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2023/09/02
date added: 2024/12/31
shelves: owned
review:

]]> 203626708
Based on years of research and close collaboration with Arvo Pärt himself, Joonas Sildre paints an atmospheric portrait of a restless artist who does not shy away from confronting state control or his own internal contradictions.

Arvo Pärt stormed the Soviet music scene in the 1960s as a brash young man pushing the limits of avant-garde modernism. Then he fell silent, no longer able to express what he felt through the musical language he had inherited. When he reemerged a decade later, he had found, in that silence between sounds, a new musical language inspired by ancient sacred music, the basis of his distinctive tintinnabuli technique. This graphic novel will appeal not just to fans of Arvo Pärt’s music but to anyone who has known the struggle to remain true to oneself whatever the cost.


“Sildre finds exciting ways to graphically depict music that shouldn’t be missed.��
—Casten Jaehner, Comic Couch

“This extraordinary book, with its interplay of calm and dynamic, goes along well with Pärt’s music. It brings fans closer to Arvo Pärt as a person and will make the uninitiated curious.��
—Dorothea Husslein, SWR 2

“Pärt seeks silence in music, and Sildre creates this silence in the pictures.��
—Gregor Lilla, Élet és Irodalom]]> 224 Joonas Sildre 1636081347 Christian 3 4.18 2018
author: Joonas Sildre
name: Christian
average rating: 4.18
book published: 2018
rating: 3
read at: 2024/12/31
date added: 2024/12/31
shelves:
review:

]]> 218569826 Underland delivers a revelatory book that transforms how we look at the natural world—and life itself.

Hailed as “a naturalist who can unfurl a sentence with the breathless ease of a master angler�� (Holly Morris, New York Times), Robert Macfarlane brings his glittering style to a profound work of travel writing, reporting, and natural history. Is a River Alive? is a joyous exploration into an ancient, urgent idea: that rivers are living beings who should be recognized as such in imagination and law. Macfarlane takes readers on three unforgettable journeys teeming with extraordinary people and places: to the miraculous cloud-forests and mountain streams of Ecuador, to the wounded creeks and lagoons of India, and to the spectacular wild rivers of Canada—imperiled by mining, pollution, and dams. Braiding these journeys is the life story of the fragile chalk stream a mile from Macfarlane’s house, which flows through his own years and days. Powered by Macfarlane’s dazzling prose and lit throughout by other voices, Is a River Alive? will open hearts, challenge perspectives, and remind us that our fate flows with that of rivers—and always has.]]> 384 Robert Macfarlane 0393242137 Christian 0 to-read 4.30 2025
author: Robert Macfarlane
name: Christian
average rating: 4.30
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/30
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 212806569 A heartrending and beautiful memoir of sudden loss and a journey to��peace, from the bestselling, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of��Horse

Many cultural and religious traditions expect those who are grieving to step away from the world. In contemporary life, we are more often met with red tape and to-do lists. This is exactly what happened to Geraldine Brooks when her partner of more than three decades, Tony Horwitz �� just sixty years old and, to her knowledge, vigorous and healthy �� collapsed and died on a Washington, D. C. sidewalk.

After spending their early years together in conflict zones as foreign correspondents, Geraldine and Tony settled down to raise two boys on Martha’s Vineyard. The life they built was one of meaningful work, good humor, and tenderness, as they spent their days writing and their evenings cooking family dinners or watching the sun set with friends at Lambert’s Cove. But all of this came to an abrupt end when, on Memorial Day 2019, Geraldine received the phone call we all dread. The demands were immediate and many. Without space to grieve, the sudden loss became a yawning gulf.

Three years later, she booked a flight to a remote island off the coast of Australia with the intention of finally giving herself the time to mourn. In a shack on a pristine, rugged coast she often went days without seeing another person. There, she pondered the varied ways��those of��other cultures grieve, such as the people of Australia's First Nations, the Balinese, and the Iranian Shiites, and what rituals of her own might help to rebuild a life around the void of Tony's death.

A spare and profoundly moving memoir that joins the classics of the genre, Memorial Days is a portrait of a larger-than-life man and a timeless love between souls��that exquisitely captures the joy, agony, and mystery of life.]]> 224 Geraldine Brooks 059365398X Christian 0 to-read 4.35 2025
author: Geraldine Brooks
name: Christian
average rating: 4.35
book published: 2025
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/12/30
shelves: to-read
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]]> 219401075 Four strangers time travel to the past and find themselves stuck on the day all their lives were changed in this stunning speculative mystery from award-winning film and television producer Dete Meserve, perfect for fans of Before the Coffee Gets Cold, Wrong Place Wrong Time and The Paradox Hotel.

What would you do if you could spend an hour in your past? Four strangers in the beach town of Ventura, California are about to find out.��

Elizabeth aches for one more precious hour with her son who died in a senseless accident. Andy is desperate to find his first love who vanished after a whirlwind romance. Logan craves the rush of surfing and mountain climbing, yearning to reclaim the freedom he lost after a misstep��landed him in a wheelchair. Brooke is looking for an hour of relief from the guilt of an unforgivable mistake.

Enter Aeon Expeditions, the groundbreaking time travel��invention of Mark Saunders—which allows��some lucky clients�� the chance��to spend an hour in their past. Even though Aeon’s technology ensures time travel can’t alter the future, all four clients,��including Mark’s ex-wife Elizabeth,��yearn to revisit the hour that changed their lives forever.��

But when their “hour�� extends beyond sixty minutes, they find themselves stranded in the past. As their paths intertwine unexpectedly, they unearth shocking secrets hidden in the shadows of their shared All their lives were shattered the same night on a secluded highway by the beach. As they delve into the hidden truths of that pivotal hour, a startling revelation emerges. They were not alone. Someone else was present, harboring deadly intentions.

The Memory Collectors is a heart-wrenching, genre-bending novel brimming with hope, grief and second chances.

]]> 336 Dete Meserve Christian 0 to-read 4.20 2025
author: Dete Meserve
name: Christian
average rating: 4.20
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/30
shelves: to-read
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]]> 215362027 A woman dives into her husband's memories to uncover a decades-old feud threatening reality itself in this staggering technothriller from the bestselling author of Ascension.

Maggie Webb has lived the last decade caring for elderly husband, Stanley, as memory loss gradually erases all the beautiful moments they created together. It's the loneliest she's ever felt in her life.

When a mysterious stranger named Hassan appears at her door, he reveals a shocking truth: Stanley isn't losing his memories. Someone is actively removing them to hide a long-buried secret from coming to light. If Maggie does what she's told, she can reverse it. She can get her husband back.

Led by Hassan and his technological marvels, Maggie breaks into her husband's mind, probing the depths of his past in an effort to save him. The deeper she dives, the more she unravels a mystery spanning continents and centuries, each layer more complex than the last.

But Hassan cannot be trusted. Not just memories are disappearing, but pieces of reality itself. If Maggie cannot find out what Stanley did all those years ago, and what Hassan is after now, she risks far more than her husband's life. The very course of human history hangs in the balance.]]> 384 Nicholas Binge 0593852168 Christian 0 to-read 4.16 2025
author: Nicholas Binge
name: Christian
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/30
shelves: to-read
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]]> 211004190
It's a whole new moooooon.

One day soon, suddenly and without explanation, the moon as we know it is replaced with an orb of cheese with the exact same mass. Through the length of an entire lunar cycle, from new moon to a spectacular and possibly final solar eclipse, we follow multiple characters -- schoolkids and scientists, billionaires and workers, preachers and politicians -- as they confront the strange new world they live in, and the absurd, impossible moon that now hangs above all their lives.]]> 326 John Scalzi 0765389096 Christian 0 to-read 3.91 2025
author: John Scalzi
name: Christian
average rating: 3.91
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/30
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 218695937 A novel about one woman’s fight for freedom, set in a near future where even dreams are under surveillance.

Sara has just landed at LAX, returning home from a conference abroad, when agents from the Risk Assessment Administration pull her aside and inform her that she will soon commit a crime. Using data from her dreams, the RAA’s algorithm has determined that she is at imminent risk of harming the person she loves most: her husband. For his safety, she must be kept under observation for twenty-one days.

The agents transfer Sara to a retention center, where she is held with other dreamers, all of them women trying to prove their innocence from different crimes. With every deviation from the strict and ever-shifting rules of the facility, their stay is extended. Months pass and Sara seems no closer to release. Then one day, a new resident arrives, disrupting the order of the facility and leading Sara on a collision course with the very companies that have deprived her of her freedom.

Eerie, urgent, and ceaselessly clear-eyed, The Dream Hotel artfully explores the seductive nature of technology, which puts us in shackles even as it makes our lives easier. Lalami asks how much of ourselves must remain private if we are to remain free, and whether even the most invasive forms of surveillance can ever capture who we really are.]]> 336 Laila Lalami 0593317602 Christian 0 to-read 3.68 2025
author: Laila Lalami
name: Christian
average rating: 3.68
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/30
shelves: to-read
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]]> 205478762 The Overstory at the height of his skills. Twelve-year-old Evie Beaulieu sinks to the bottom of a swimming pool in Montreal strapped to one of the world’s first aqualungs. Ina Aroita grows up on naval bases across the Pacific with art as her only home. Two polar opposites at an elite Chicago high school bond over a three-thousand-year-old board game; Rafi Young will get lost in literature, while Todd Keane’s work will lead to a startling AI breakthrough.

They meet on the history-scarred island of Makatea in French Polynesia, whose deposits of phosphorus once helped to feed the world. Now the tiny atoll has been chosen for humanity’s next adventure: a plan to send floating, autonomous cities out onto the open sea. But first, the island’s residents must vote to greenlight the project or turn the seasteaders away.

Set in the world’s largest ocean, this awe-filled book explores that last wild place we have yet to colonize in a still-unfolding oceanic game, and interweaves beautiful writing, rich characterization, profound themes of technology and the environment, and a deep exploration of our shared humanity in a way only Richard Powers can.]]> 381 Richard Powers 1324086033 Christian 5
As someone who is inundated by AI speak in my social circles everyday, I relished seeing a truly unique perspective on the subject. It’s art like this which helps us all better understand technology and why I think there’s more to learn from novels than from non-fiction.

I love that the sea, the most ancient environment on earth, is the setting for this novel. It’s not something I’m particularly interested in but the author pulls me in through several characters.

Amidst the brilliant storytelling, Powers details heartwarming and heartbreaking relationships. Each relationship and its growth over time are entire novels unto themselves.

I read this right after a book on the history of consciousness, and several months after reading the novel MANIACall of which reference the game Go, AI, and define consciousness in their own ways. I’ve got a lot to think about in 2025.]]> 4.16 2024
author: Richard Powers
name: Christian
average rating: 4.16
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2024/12/30
date added: 2024/12/30
shelves:
review:
What a book to finish 2024 with. It started incredibly slow for me as I got immersed in the myriad stories. But somewhere around 90 pages in, it was clear to me I was reading something profound.

As someone who is inundated by AI speak in my social circles everyday, I relished seeing a truly unique perspective on the subject. It’s art like this which helps us all better understand technology and why I think there’s more to learn from novels than from non-fiction.

I love that the sea, the most ancient environment on earth, is the setting for this novel. It’s not something I’m particularly interested in but the author pulls me in through several characters.

Amidst the brilliant storytelling, Powers details heartwarming and heartbreaking relationships. Each relationship and its growth over time are entire novels unto themselves.

I read this right after a book on the history of consciousness, and several months after reading the novel MANIACall of which reference the game Go, AI, and define consciousness in their own ways. I’ve got a lot to think about in 2025.
]]> 13079982 Sixty years after its original publication, Ray Bradbury’s internationally acclaimed novel Fahrenheit 451 stands as a classic of world literature set in a bleak, dystopian future. Today its message has grown more relevant than ever before.

Guy Montag is a fireman. His job is to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, along with the houses in which they are hidden. Montag never questions the destruction and ruin his actions produce, returning each day to his bland life and wife, Mildred, who spends all day with her television “family.�� But when he meets an eccentric young neighbor, Clarisse, who introduces him to a past where people didn’t live in fear and to a present where one sees the world through the ideas in books instead of the mindless chatter of television, Montag begins to question everything he has ever known.]]> 194 Ray Bradbury Christian 0 to-read 3.97 1953
author: Ray Bradbury
name: Christian
average rating: 3.97
book published: 1953
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/27
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 157060283 360 Riccardo Rebonato 1009405004 Christian 0 to-read, not-at-library 3.00
author: Riccardo Rebonato
name: Christian
average rating: 3.00
book published:
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/27
shelves: to-read, not-at-library
review:

]]> 432075 331 Gordon Ramsay 0007229682 Christian 0 to-read, owned 3.79 2006
author: Gordon Ramsay
name: Christian
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/27
shelves: to-read, owned
review:

]]> 127938747 From a visionary Mexican author, a hallucinatory, revelatory, colonial revenge story that reimagines the fall of Tenochtitlan.

One morning in 1519, conquistador Hernán Cortés entered the city of Tenochtitlan �� today's Mexico City. Later that day, he would meet the emperor Moctezuma in a collision of two worlds, two empires, two languages, two possible futures.

Cortés was accompanied by his nine captains, his troops, and his two translators: Friar Aguilar, a taciturn, former slave, and Malinalli, a strategic, former princess. Greeted at a ceremonial welcome meal by the steely princess Atotoxli, sister and wife of Moctezuma, the Spanish nearly bungle their entrance to the city. As they await their meeting with Moctezuma �� who is at a political, spiritual, and physical crossroads, and relies on hallucinogens to get himself through the day and in quest for any kind of answer from the gods �� the Spanish are ensconced in the labyrinthine palace. Soon, one of Cortés’s captains, Jazmín Caldera, overwhelmed by the grandeur of the city, begins to question the ease with which they were welcomed into the city, and wonders at the risks of getting out alive, much less conquering the empire.

You Dreamed of Empires brings to life Tenochtitlan at its height, and reimagines its destiny. The incomparably original Alvaro Enrigue sets afire the moment of conquest and turns it into a moment of revolution, a restitutive, fantastical counter-attack, in a novel so electric and so unique that it feels like a dream.]]> 220 Álvaro Enrigue 059354479X Christian 0 to-read 3.76 2022
author: Álvaro Enrigue
name: Christian
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2022
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 181109972 What if calling someone stupid was illegal? In a reality not too distant from our own, where the so-called Mental Parity Movement has taken hold, the worst thing you can call someone is 'stupid'.

Everyone is equally clever, and discrimination based on intelligence is 'the last great civil rights fight'.

Exams and grades are all discarded, and smart phones are rebranded. Children are expelled for saying the S-word and encouraged to report parents for using it. You don't need a qualification to be a doctor.

Best friends since adolescence, Pearson and Emory find themselves on opposing sides of this new culture war. Radio personality Emory �� who has built her career riding the tide of popular thought �� makes increasingly hard-line statements while, for her part, Pearson believes the whole thing is ludicrous.

As their friendship fractures, Pearson's determination to cling onto the 'old, bigoted way of thinking' begins to endanger her job, her safety and even her family.

Lionel Shriver turns her piercing gaze on the policing of opinion and intellect, and imagines a world in which intellectual meritocracy is heresy. Hilarious, deadpan, scathing and at times frighteningly plausible, MANIA will delight the many fans of her fiction and journalism alike.]]> 288 Lionel Shriver 0063345390 Christian 0 to-read 3.58 2024
author: Lionel Shriver
name: Christian
average rating: 3.58
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: to-read
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]]> 150778765 In Help Wanted, Adelle Waldman brings her unparalleled wit and knack for social observation to the world of work.

At a big-box store in a small town in upstate New York, the members of Team Movement clock in every morning at 3:55. Under the eye of a self-absorbed and barely competent boss, they empty the day’s truck of merchandise, stock the shelves, and scatter before customers arrive. When a golden opportunity for a promotion presents itself, the diverse members of Movement―among them a comedy-obsessed oddball who acts half his age, a young woman clinging to her “cool kid�� status from high school, a college football hopeful trying to find a new path―band together and set a just-so-crazy-it-might-work plot into motion. A darkly comic workplace caper that explores the aches and uses of solidarity, Help Wanted is a deeply human portrait of people trying, against increasingly long odds, to make a living.]]> 288 Adelle Waldman 132402044X Christian 0 to-read 3.56 2024
author: Adelle Waldman
name: Christian
average rating: 3.56
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: to-read
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]]> 197789783
From the porch of his home, Charles Lamosway has watched the life he might have had unfold across the river on Maine’s Penobscot Reservation. On the far bank, he caught brief moments of his neighbor Elizabeth’s life—from the day she came home from the hospital to her early twenties. But there’s always been something deeper and more dangerous than the river that divides him from her and the rest of the tribal community. It’s the secret that Elizabeth is his daughter, a secret Charles is no longer willing to keep.

Now, it’s been weeks since he’s seen Elizabeth, and Charles is worried. As he attempts to hold on to and care for what he can—his home and property; his alcoholic, quick-tempered, and bighearted friend Bobby; and his mother, Louise, who is slipping ever deeper into dementia—he becomes increasingly haunted by his past. Forced to confront a lost childhood on the reservation, a love affair cut short, and the death of his beloved stepfather, Fredrick, in a hunting accident—a death he and Louise are at odds over as to where to lay blame—Charles contends with questions he’s long been afraid to ask. Is his secret about Elizabeth his to share? And would his daughter want to know the truth, even if it could cost her everything she’s ever known?

From the award-winning author of Night of the Living Rez, Morgan Talty’s debut novel, Fire Exit, is a masterful and unforgettable story of family, legacy, bloodlines, culture and inheritance, and what, if anything, we owe one another]]> 243 Morgan Talty 1959030558 Christian 0 to-read 3.71 2024
author: Morgan Talty
name: Christian
average rating: 3.71
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: to-read
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]]> 62919746
When Judith Jones began working at Doubleday’s Paris office in 1949, the twenty-five-year-old spent most of her time wading through manuscripts in the slush pile until one caught her eye. She read the book in one sitting, then begged her boss to consider publishing it. A year later, Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl became a bestseller. It was the start of a culture defining career in publishing.

Over more than half a century as an editor at Knopf, Jones became a legend, nurturing future literary icons such as Sylvia Plath, Anne Tyler, and John Updike. At the forefront of the cookbook revolution, she published the who’s who of food: Edna Lewis, M.F.K. Fisher, Madhur Jaffrey, James Beard, and, most famously, Julia Child. Jones celebrated culinary diversity, forever changing the way Americans think about food.

Her work spanned the decades of America’s most dramatic cultural change. From the end of World War II through the Cold War; from the civil rights movement to the fight for women’s equality, Jones’s work questioned convention, using books as a tool of quiet resistance.

Now, her astonishing and career is explored for the first time. Based on exclusive interviews, never-before-seen personal papers, and years of research, The Editor tells the riveting behind-the scenes-narrative of how stories are made, finally bringing to light the audacious life of one of our most influential tastemakers.]]> 336 Sara B. Franklin 1982134348 Christian 0 to-read 4.21
author: Sara B. Franklin
name: Christian
average rating: 4.21
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/12/26
shelves: to-read
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]]> 203173539
But no products and production have dematerialised. The goods and services provided by the leading companies of the twenty-first century appear on your screen, fit in your pocket, or occupy your head. Ownership of the means of production is a redundant concept. Workers are the means of production; increasingly, they take the plant home. Capital is a service bought from a specialist supplier with little influence over customer businesses. The professional managers who run modern corporations do not exert authority because they are wealthy; they are wealthy because they exert authority.

The pharmaceutical industry (or Big Pharma) creates life-saving vaccines and ramps drug prices up to near-unaffordable levels. Amazon gives us next-day delivery on almost everything and has its workers urinate in bottles rather than take breaks. John Kay's incisive overhaul of our ideas about business redefines our understanding of successful commercial activity and the corporation - and describes how we have come to 'love the product' as we 'hate the producer.' This is a brilliant and original work from one of the greatest economists.]]> 448 John Kay 1805221736 Christian 0 to-read 3.80 2024
author: John Kay
name: Christian
average rating: 3.80
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/12/25
shelves: to-read
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]]> 58085266
Why do you exist? How did atoms and molecules transform into sentient creatures that experience longing, regret, compassion, and even marvel at their own existence? What does it truly mean to have a mind—to think? Science has offered few answers to these existential questions until now.

Journey of the Mind is the first book to offer a unified account of the mind that explains how consciousness, language, self-awareness, and civilization arose incrementally out of chaos. The journey begins three billion years ago with the emergence of the universe’s simplest possible mind. From there, the book explores the nanoscopic archaeon, whose thinking machinery consists of a handful of molecules, then advances through amoebas, worms, frogs, birds, monkeys, and humans, explaining what each “new�� mind could do that previous minds could not. Though they admire the triumph of human consciousness, Ogi Ogas and Sai Gaddam argue that humans are hardly the most sophisticated minds on the planet. The same physical principles that produce human self-awareness are leading cities and nation-states to develop “superminds,�� and perhaps planting the seeds for even higher forms of consciousness.

Written in lively, accessible language accompanied by vivid illustrations, Journey of the Mind is a mind-bending work of popular science, the first general book to share the cutting-edge mathematical basis for consciousness, language, and the self. It shows how a “unified theory of the mind�� can explain the mind’s greatest mysteries—and offer clues about the ultimate fate of all minds in the universe.]]> 432 Ogi Ogas 1324006579 Christian 5
They use illustrations and scaffold chapters brilliantly. I wish more writers did that. They also didn’t concern themselves with being exhaustive on the topic of consciousness, showing their full awareness they were approaching a layperson with this book. They summarized highly complex subjects from geniuses like Grossberg in a way that I can understand.

There are dozens of concepts that will stick with me for weeks but one in particular I found fascinating is the concept of a super mind. The idea that our consciousness only really exists as a result of interacting with other Homo sapiens is not something I’d ever considered before. ]]> 3.89
author: Ogi Ogas
name: Christian
average rating: 3.89
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2024/12/25
date added: 2024/12/25
shelves:
review:
Writing a book covering such a nebulous topic like consciousness, while rooting in the sciences must be incredibly challenging. So the fact that these authors wrote this in such a comprehensible manner, leaves me incredibly grateful. And most importantly, more enlightened and inspired than I’ve been after reading a non-fiction book in years.

They use illustrations and scaffold chapters brilliantly. I wish more writers did that. They also didn’t concern themselves with being exhaustive on the topic of consciousness, showing their full awareness they were approaching a layperson with this book. They summarized highly complex subjects from geniuses like Grossberg in a way that I can understand.

There are dozens of concepts that will stick with me for weeks but one in particular I found fascinating is the concept of a super mind. The idea that our consciousness only really exists as a result of interacting with other Homo sapiens is not something I’d ever considered before.
]]> 17286670
A surprising and intriguing examination of how scarcity—and our flawed responses to it—shapes our lives, our society, and our culture

Why do successful people get things done at the last minute? Why does poverty persist? Why do organizations get stuck firefighting? Why do the lonely find it hard to make friends? These questions seem unconnected, yet Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir show that they are all are examples of a mind-set produced by scarcity.

Drawing on cutting-edge research from behavioral science and economics, Mullainathan and Shafir show that scarcity creates a similar psychology for everyone struggling to manage with less than they need. Busy people fail to manage their time efficiently for the same reasons the poor and those maxed out on credit cards fail to manage their money. The dynamics of scarcity reveal why dieters find it hard to resist temptation, why students and busy executives mismanage their time, and why sugarcane farmers are smarter after harvest than before. Once we start thinking in terms of scarcity and the strategies it imposes, the problems of modern life come into sharper focus.

Mullainathan and Shafir discuss how scarcity affects our daily lives, recounting anecdotes of their own foibles and making surprising connections that bring this research alive. Their book provides a new way of understanding why the poor stay poor and the busy stay busy, and it reveals not only how scarcity leads us astray but also how individuals and organizations can better manage scarcity for greater satisfaction and success.

]]> 304 Sendhil Mullainathan 0805092641 Christian 4 owned 3.92 2013
author: Sendhil Mullainathan
name: Christian
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2013
rating: 4
read at: 2020/10/20
date added: 2024/12/21
shelves: owned
review:

]]> 76865
The Challenge
Built to Last, the defining management study of the nineties, showed how great companies triumph over time and how long-term sustained performance can be engineered into the DNA of an enterprise from the very beginning.

But what about the company that is not born with great DNA? How can good companies, mediocre companies, even bad companies achieve enduring greatness?

The Study
For years, this question preyed on the mind of Jim Collins. Are there companies that defy gravity and convert long-term mediocrity or worse into long-term superiority? And if so, what are the universal distinguishing characteristics that cause a company to go from good to great?

The Standards
Using tough benchmarks, Collins and his research team identified a set of elite companies that made the leap to great results and sustained those results for at least fifteen years. How great? After the leap, the good-to-great companies generated cumulative stock returns that beat the general stock market by an average of seven times in fifteen years, better than twice the results delivered by a composite index of the world's greatest companies, including Coca-Cola, Intel, General Electric, and Merck.

The Comparisons
The research team contrasted the good-to-great companies with a carefully selected set of comparison companies that failed to make the leap from good to great. What was different? Why did one set of companies become truly great performers while the other set remained only good?

The Findings
The findings of the Good to Great study will surprise many readers and shed light on virtually every area of management strategy and practice. The findings include:
Level 5 Leaders: The research team was shocked to discover the type of leadership required to achieve greatness.

The Hedgehog Concept (Simplicity within the Three Circles): To go from good to great requires transcending the curse of competence.

A Culture of Discipline: When you combine a culture of discipline with an ethic of entrepreneurship, you get the magical alchemy of great results. Technology Accelerators: Good-to-great companies think differently about the role of technology.

The Flywheel and the Doom Loop: Those who launch radical change programs and wrenching restructurings will almost certainly fail to make the leap.]]> 300 Jim Collins 0066620996 Christian 4 owned 4.12 2001
author: Jim Collins
name: Christian
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2001
rating: 4
read at: 2019/05/26
date added: 2024/12/21
shelves: owned
review:

]]> 54734969
We burn 2,000 calories a day. And if we exercise and cut carbs, we'll lose more weight. Right? Wrong. In this paradigm-shifting book, Herman Pontzer reveals for the first time how human metabolism really works so that we can finally manage our weight and improve our health.

Pontzer's groundbreaking studies with hunter-gatherer tribes show how exercise doesn't increase our metabolism. Instead, we burn calories within a very narrow nearly 3,000 calories per day, no matter our activity level. This was a brilliant evolutionary strategy to survive in times of famine. Now it seems to doom us to obesity. The good news is we can lose weight, but we need to cut calories. Refuting such weight-loss hype as paleo, keto, anti-gluten, anti-grain, and even vegan, Pontzer discusses how all diets succeed or For shedding pounds, a calorie is a calorie.

At the same time, we must exercise to keep our body systems and signals functioning optimally, even if it won't make us thinner. Hunter-gatherers like the Hadza move about five hours a day and remain remarkably healthy into old age. But elite athletes can push the body too far, burning calories faster than their bodies can take them in. It may be that the most spectacular athletic feats are the result not just of great training, but of an astonishingly efficient digestive system.

Revealing, irreverent, and always entertaining, Pontzer has written a book that will change how you eat, move, and live.]]> 384 Herman Pontzer 0525541527 Christian 4 owned
But that provides a great foundation for the truly groundbreaking insights he shares on how our bodies maintain a base metabolic rate regardless of how much energy we expend. This book definitely delivers on its claim to upend everything we’re told about weight loss; and he does it with tremendous research.

The book loses its way a bit in the final chapter when he touches on energy beyond just humans and into food production and climate change. It does help round out the picture of energy, but that’s better covered in other books and deviated too far away from his central theme of human metabolism.

Overall, though, this is a must-read for anyone who wants to better understand nutrition and metabolism.]]> 4.08 2021
author: Herman Pontzer
name: Christian
average rating: 4.08
book published: 2021
rating: 4
read at: 2021/12/30
date added: 2024/12/21
shelves: owned
review:
It takes a while for this book to get its stride because there’s a lot of science he covers to lay the groundwork for the rest of the book to make sense. He breaks down the metabolic engine of our body really well although admittedly, I don’t think much of it will stick without re-reading the first two chapters again.

But that provides a great foundation for the truly groundbreaking insights he shares on how our bodies maintain a base metabolic rate regardless of how much energy we expend. This book definitely delivers on its claim to upend everything we’re told about weight loss; and he does it with tremendous research.

The book loses its way a bit in the final chapter when he touches on energy beyond just humans and into food production and climate change. It does help round out the picture of energy, but that’s better covered in other books and deviated too far away from his central theme of human metabolism.

Overall, though, this is a must-read for anyone who wants to better understand nutrition and metabolism.
]]> 25899336
At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade's worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated. When Breath Becomes Air chronicles Kalanithi's transformation from a naïve medical student "possessed," as he wrote, "by the question of what, given that all organisms die, makes a virtuous and meaningful life" into a neurosurgeon at Stanford working in the brain, the most critical place for human identity, and finally into a patient and new father confronting his own mortality.

What makes life worth living in the face of death? What do you do when the future, no longer a ladder toward your goals in life, flattens out into a perpetual present? What does it mean to have a child, to nurture a new life as another fades away? These are some of the questions Kalanithi wrestles with in this profoundly moving, exquisitely observed memoir.

Paul Kalanithi died in March 2015, while working on this book, yet his words live on as a guide and a gift to us all. "I began to realize that coming face to face with my own mortality, in a sense, had changed nothing and everything," he wrote. "Seven words from Samuel Beckett began to repeat in my head: 'I can't go on. I'll go on.'" When Breath Becomes Air is an unforgettable, life-affirming reflection on the challenge of facing death and on the relationship between doctor and patient, from a brilliant writer who became both.]]> 208 Paul Kalanithi 0812988418 Christian 4 owned 4.41 2016
author: Paul Kalanithi
name: Christian
average rating: 4.41
book published: 2016
rating: 4
read at: 2016/12/30
date added: 2024/12/21
shelves: owned
review:

]]> 866426 From the Trade Paperback edition.]]> 352 Lee Iacocca 0553050672 Christian 0 to-read, owned 3.67 1984
author: Lee Iacocca
name: Christian
average rating: 3.67
book published: 1984
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/21
shelves: to-read, owned
review:

]]> 11084145 630 Walter Isaacson 1451648537 Christian 0 to-read, owned 4.15 2011
author: Walter Isaacson
name: Christian
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2011
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/21
shelves: to-read, owned
review:

]]> 25663961 New York Times Bestseller

"This book may help those who are susceptible to illnesses that can be prevented."—His Holiness the Dalai Lama

"Absolutely the best book I've read on nutrition and diet" –Dan Buettner, author of The Blue Zones Solution

From the physician behind the wildly popular NutritionFacts website, How Not to Die reveals the groundbreaking scientific evidence behind the only diet that can prevent and reverse many of the causes of disease-related death.

The vast majority of premature deaths can be prevented through simple changes in diet and lifestyle. In How Not to Die, Dr. Michael Greger, the internationally-renowned nutrition expert, physician, and founder of NutritionFacts, examines the fifteen top causes of premature death in America-heart disease, various cancers, diabetes, Parkinson's, high blood pressure, and more-and explains how nutritional and lifestyle interventions can sometimes trump prescription pills and other pharmaceutical and surgical approaches, freeing us to live healthier lives.

The simple truth is that most doctors are good at treating acute illnesses but bad at preventing chronic disease. The fifteen leading causes of death claim the lives of 1.6 million Americans annually. This doesn't have to be the case. By following Dr. Greger's advice, all of it backed up by strong scientific evidence, you will learn which foods to eat and which lifestyle changes to make to live longer.

History of prostate cancer in your family? Put down that glass of milk and add flaxseed to your diet whenever you can. Have high blood pressure? Hibiscus tea can work better than a leading hypertensive drug-and without the side effects. Fighting off liver disease? Drinking coffee can reduce liver inflammation. Battling breast cancer? Consuming soy is associated with prolonged survival. Worried about heart disease (the number 1 killer in the United States)? Switch to a whole-food, plant-based diet, which has been repeatedly shown not just to prevent the disease but often stop it in its tracks.

In addition to showing what to eat to help treat the top fifteen causes of death, How Not to Die includes Dr. Greger's Daily Dozen -a checklist of the twelve foods we should consume every day. Full of practical, actionable advice and surprising, cutting edge nutritional science, these doctor's orders are just what we need to live longer, healthier lives.]]> 576 Michael Greger 1250066115 Christian 0 to-read, owned 4.41 2015
author: Michael Greger
name: Christian
average rating: 4.41
book published: 2015
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/21
shelves: to-read, owned
review:

]]> 51834801 898 Paul Kennedy Christian 0 to-read, owned 4.39 1987
author: Paul Kennedy
name: Christian
average rating: 4.39
book published: 1987
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/21
shelves: to-read, owned
review:

]]> 41812830 776 Rick Atkinson 1627790438 Christian 0 to-read, owned 4.39 2019
author: Rick Atkinson
name: Christian
average rating: 4.39
book published: 2019
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/21
shelves: to-read, owned
review:

]]> 60568507
From legacy manufacturers to emerging tech giants, corporations wield significant power over our lives, our economy, and our politics. Some celebrate them as engines of progress and prosperity. Others argue that they recklessly pursue profit at the expense of us all.

In For Profit , law professor William Magnuson reveals that both visions contain an element of truth. The story of the corporation is a human story, about a diverse group of merchants, bankers, and investors that have over time come to shape the landscape of our modern economy. Its central characters include both the brave, powerful, and ingenious and the conniving, fraudulent, and vicious. At times, these characters have been one and the same.

Yet as Magnuson shows, while corporations haven’t always behaved admirably, their purpose is a noble one. From their beginnings in the Roman Republic, corporations have been designed to promote the common good. By recapturing this spirit of civic virtue, For Profit argues, corporations can help craft a society in which all of us—not just shareholders—benefit from the profits of enterprise.]]> 357 William Magnuson 1541601564 Christian 3
But as a book I was disappointed. The author attempts to draw common threads between these stories but I think he left some overarching themes and patterns untouched. Ultimately he chose examples of each type of corporation that went to excess rather than surveying more sustainable and “good�� versions of these. For startups he chose Facebook? Not representative of startups at all, IMO.

More importantly the types of corporations Magnuson covers are not really in the same categories. One chapter is “The Raider�� that covers LBOs. There’s almost nothing intrinsically positive in that corporation type. And to put it on the same playing field as a startup or even assembly line is disjointed. Much of the Startup chapter covered VC so why wasn’t that covered?

And by simply choosing a subset of corporation types and then covering the most extreme versions of each, he renders his conclusion chapter pretty worthless. He recommends ways to improve corporations that all involve the corporation’s willing participation. Saying things like “don’t undermine the republic,�� or “treat your workers right�� are pretty hollow recommendations in a book where every company covered has willfully (and at times is quoted), done the opposite. In short, the greedy corporations would laugh at such a weak conclusion. I mean KKR exists literally only to profit. They couldn’t care less about their impact.

And that’s my own personal negative conclusion drawn here. Whereas reforms have curtailed corporate greed in the past through things like the Sherman Act, the chapter on KKR and Facebook indicated there are almost zero repercussions or reforms happening any longer. But again this is relevant to the EXTREME cases he covers. If he’d covered the less greedy companies we could actually see these principles at work. Instead they ring hollow and fairly common sense against a backdrop of the worst excesses capitalism has to offer.]]> 3.94
author: William Magnuson
name: Christian
average rating: 3.94
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2024/12/15
date added: 2024/12/15
shelves:
review:
I enjoyed this book because I was unfamiliar with some of these stories and I appreciated having these corporations that spanned centuries and geography all together. I mean where else can you read about KKR and Rome’s ancient tax collectors together?

But as a book I was disappointed. The author attempts to draw common threads between these stories but I think he left some overarching themes and patterns untouched. Ultimately he chose examples of each type of corporation that went to excess rather than surveying more sustainable and “good�� versions of these. For startups he chose Facebook? Not representative of startups at all, IMO.

More importantly the types of corporations Magnuson covers are not really in the same categories. One chapter is “The Raider�� that covers LBOs. There’s almost nothing intrinsically positive in that corporation type. And to put it on the same playing field as a startup or even assembly line is disjointed. Much of the Startup chapter covered VC so why wasn’t that covered?

And by simply choosing a subset of corporation types and then covering the most extreme versions of each, he renders his conclusion chapter pretty worthless. He recommends ways to improve corporations that all involve the corporation’s willing participation. Saying things like “don’t undermine the republic,�� or “treat your workers right�� are pretty hollow recommendations in a book where every company covered has willfully (and at times is quoted), done the opposite. In short, the greedy corporations would laugh at such a weak conclusion. I mean KKR exists literally only to profit. They couldn’t care less about their impact.

And that’s my own personal negative conclusion drawn here. Whereas reforms have curtailed corporate greed in the past through things like the Sherman Act, the chapter on KKR and Facebook indicated there are almost zero repercussions or reforms happening any longer. But again this is relevant to the EXTREME cases he covers. If he’d covered the less greedy companies we could actually see these principles at work. Instead they ring hollow and fairly common sense against a backdrop of the worst excesses capitalism has to offer.
]]> 35605446
Everyone learns how to run at an early age. It's naturally wired into your body. Yet in recent years, running has become complicated by trendy gadgets and doctrine. With a Boston Marathon win and over 100,000 miles run on his resume, Amby Burfoot steers the sport back to its simple roots in Run Forever . From a warm and welcoming perspective, Burfoot provides clear, actionable guidance to runners of every age and ability level.

Whether you are a beginner runner or experienced marathoner, Run Forever will show you how to motivate yourself, avoid injuries, increase speed and endurance, and reach your goals. Best of all, you'll enjoy optimal health throughout your life.]]> 256 Amby Burfoot 1546083111 Christian 4 owned
If you’re a competitive runner, you won’t find much use in this but for the bell curve, it’s an absolutely essential and highly readable book.]]> 4.09
author: Amby Burfoot
name: Christian
average rating: 4.09
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2021/04/02
date added: 2024/12/14
shelves: owned
review:
Surely this must be the most practical and broadly scoped book on running there is. I picked up running as a new pandemic-era habit. Since then I’ve learned a lot about it, from proper form and goal-setting, to nutrition and practice. You can cobble a lot of that together through internet searches but you’re never sure if what you’re reading is sound or even healthy. But this book captures ALL of it for beginner runners to those who’ve run for years.

If you’re a competitive runner, you won’t find much use in this but for the bell curve, it’s an absolutely essential and highly readable book.
]]> 2544454 Siddhartha explores the struggle of the soul to see beyond the illusions of humankind and achieve a deeper wisdom through spirituality.

Born into wealth and privilege, Siddhartha renounces his place among India's nobility to wander the countryside in search of meaning. He learns suffering and self-denial among a group of ascetics before meeting the Buddha and coming to realize that true peace cannot be taught: It must be experienced. Changing his path yet again, Siddhatha reenters human society and earns a great fortune. Yet over time this life leaves Siddhartha restless and empty. He achieves enlightenment only when he stops searching and surrenders to the oneness of all.

Rika Lesser's new translation deftly evokes the lyricism and quiet beauty of Hesse's novel, which first appeared in German in 1922. At once personal and universal, Siddhartha stands outside of time, resonating in the hearts of truth-seekers everywhere.]]> 160 Hermann Hesse 1593083793 Christian 0 to-read, owned 4.02 1922
author: Hermann Hesse
name: Christian
average rating: 4.02
book published: 1922
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/14
shelves: to-read, owned
review:

]]> 4820 HOW DID AMERICA BEGIN?

This simple question launches acclaimed author Nathaniel Philbrick on an extraordinary journey to understand the truth behind our most sacred national myth: the voyage of the Mayflower and the settlement of Plymouth Colony. As Philbrick reveals in this electrifying new book, the story of the Pilgrims does not end with the First Thanksgiving; instead, it is a fifty-five-year epic that is at once tragic and heroic, and still carries meaning for us today.]]> 461 Nathaniel Philbrick 0670037605 Christian 0 to-read, owned 3.87 2006
author: Nathaniel Philbrick
name: Christian
average rating: 3.87
book published: 2006
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/12/14
shelves: to-read, owned
review:

]]> 44326335 A provocative account of capitalism's rise to global dominance and, as different models of capitalism vie for world leadership, a look into what the future may hold.

We are all capitalists now. For the first time in human history, the globe is dominated by one economic system. In Capitalism, Alone, leading economist Branko Milanovic explains the reasons for this decisive historical shift since the days of feudalism and, later, communism. Surveying the varieties of capitalism, he asks: What are the prospects for a fairer world now that capitalism is the only game in town? His conclusions are sobering, but not fatalistic. Capitalism gets much wrong, but also much right--and it is not going anywhere. Our task is to improve it.

Milanovic argues that capitalism has triumphed because it works. It delivers prosperity and gratifies human desires for autonomy. But it comes with a moral price, pushing us to treat material success as the ultimate goal. And it offers no guarantee of stability. In the West, liberal capitalism creaks under the strains of inequality and capitalist excess. That model now fights for hearts and minds with political capitalism, exemplified by China, which many claim is more efficient, but which is more vulnerable to corruption and, when growth is slow, social unrest. As for the economic problems of the Global South, Milanovic offers a creative, if controversial, plan for large-scale migration. Looking to the future, he dismisses prophets who proclaim some single outcome to be inevitable, whether worldwide prosperity or robot-driven mass unemployment. Capitalism is a risky system. But it is a human system. Our choices, and how clearly we see them, will determine how it serves us.]]> 304 Branko Milanović 0674987594 Christian 5
So why read this book if you’re not in finance or economics (I’m in tech and marketing)? In short, it helps explain the overarching motivations of economic systems that are dominating today. And for someone living in the hyper-capitalist US, it helped me understand the merits and drawbacks of our own system. China is notoriously tight-lipped about their economic system but this book really helps elucidate how and WHY it works. Probably the most interesting conclusions the author made are the conditions under which a political capitalist system like China’s could succeed or not. I loosely follow their influence in Africa, and this helped me understand how it may or may not succeed. What I particularly appreciated was the lack of political bias in the book; he writes this objectively like a scientist and less like the moronic talking heads of American media. ]]> 4.12 2019
author: Branko Milanović
name: Christian
average rating: 4.12
book published: 2019
rating: 5
read at: 2024/11/16
date added: 2024/12/07
shelves:
review:
I really didn’t like this book at the outset. It’s a field I’m not an expert in and I immediately felt like I was dropped into someone’s thesis paper. But I read positive reviews and decided to read the final chapter immediately after the first and it made all the difference. From there I read chapters 2-4 where he covered the liberal meritocracy of USA and the political capitalism of China in more detail. Maybe I needed the summaries to make sense of his key points.

So why read this book if you’re not in finance or economics (I’m in tech and marketing)? In short, it helps explain the overarching motivations of economic systems that are dominating today. And for someone living in the hyper-capitalist US, it helped me understand the merits and drawbacks of our own system. China is notoriously tight-lipped about their economic system but this book really helps elucidate how and WHY it works. Probably the most interesting conclusions the author made are the conditions under which a political capitalist system like China’s could succeed or not. I loosely follow their influence in Africa, and this helped me understand how it may or may not succeed. What I particularly appreciated was the lack of political bias in the book; he writes this objectively like a scientist and less like the moronic talking heads of American media.
]]> 203578812 A standalone darkly humorous thriller set in modern America's age of anxiety, by New York Times bestselling author Jason Pargin.

Outside Los Angeles, a driver pulls up to find a young woman sitting on a large black box. She offers him $200,000 cash to transport her and that box across the country, to Washington, DC.

But there are rules:

He cannot look inside the box.
He cannot ask questions.
He cannot tell anyone.
They must leave immediately.
He must leave all trackable devices behind.

As these eccentric misfits hit the road, rumors spread on social media that the box is part of a carefully orchestrated terror attack intended to plunge the USA into civil war.

The truth promises to be even stranger, and may change how you see the world.]]> 400 Jason Pargin 125028595X Christian 5
The dual meaning of the “black box of doom�� isn’t subtle but I also loved it. I think people might be turned off by some of the monologues that the characters deliver that speak to this metaphor and the underlying social commentary. And that’s fair. But if you judge this book based on the premise that it’s meant to be accessible to many readers, the dialogs provide thought-provoking meditations on some heavy issues regarding polarization and hate speech online.

Anyway, I loved the characters, I enjoyed the plot, and I appreciated the message. It was enjoyable while also giving me some perspective to ponder.]]> 3.97 2024
author: Jason Pargin
name: Christian
average rating: 3.97
book published: 2024
rating: 5
read at: 2024/12/06
date added: 2024/12/07
shelves:
review:
This is a sneaky good book. It’s sneaky because it’s a thriller that’s hiding a really smart social commentary about the toxic disconnection of today’s adults through online channels.

The dual meaning of the “black box of doom�� isn’t subtle but I also loved it. I think people might be turned off by some of the monologues that the characters deliver that speak to this metaphor and the underlying social commentary. And that’s fair. But if you judge this book based on the premise that it’s meant to be accessible to many readers, the dialogs provide thought-provoking meditations on some heavy issues regarding polarization and hate speech online.

Anyway, I loved the characters, I enjoyed the plot, and I appreciated the message. It was enjoyable while also giving me some perspective to ponder.
]]> 201751520
In Life as No One Knows It, physicist and astrobiologist Sara Imari Walker argues that solving the origin of life requires radical new thinking and an experimentally testable theory for what life is. This is an urgent issue for efforts to make life from scratch in laboratories here on Earth and missions searching for life on other planets.

Walker proposes a new paradigm for understanding what physics encompasses and what we recognize as life. She invites us into a world of maverick scientists working without a map, seeking not just answers but better ways to formulate the biggest questions we have about the universe. The book culminates with the bold proposal of a new theory for identifying and classifying life, one that applies not just to biological life on Earth but to any instance of life in the universe. Rigorous, accessible, and vital, Life as No One Knows It celebrates the mystery of life and the explanatory power of physics.]]> 272 Sara Imari Walker 0593191897 Christian 2
Aside from my own self-induced letdown, this book is objectively not a great read. It’s only 242 pages yet the first 90, a full third, comprise the introduction. That’s the page she first introduces the term “assembly theory.�� For a book that underpins its entire thesis on a new theory, it’s weird that it’s introduced so late.

Her explanations drift quite a bit. She often says she’s going to explain something but spends several pages drifting into pontification rather than explanation.

The style of the book itself is weird as well. She refers to people by their first name. Far be it from me to enforce rules of formality on someone but I find it bizarre that after introducing someone of John von Neumann’s stature, she calls him Johnny thereafter, the same way she refers to a colleague she actively works with named “Mike.��

But ultimately my criticism is that this book is confused as to whether it’s about her personal discovery and journey to understanding life, or whether it’s meant to explain the concepts. She provides uninteresting details about a lab in Glasgow, or pages referencing meta-analyses of paradigm shifts by introducing Thomas Kuhn. Overall she does this more than explaining her actual theories or attempted paradigm shift. It’s hard to tell what her goal is. The book ends abruptly with no synthesis, or conclusion as if she just decided to stop writing and move on to something else.]]> 3.88
author: Sara Imari Walker
name: Christian
average rating: 3.88
book published:
rating: 2
read at: 2024/12/07
date added: 2024/12/07
shelves:
review:
I was profoundly disappointed in this book; a result partly borne of my own personal excitement for the book after being introduced to assembly theory on the Santa Fe Institute’s podcast series. I finished this believing that podcast series is immensely better at explaining assembly theory, and also excited for someone else to write about it.

Aside from my own self-induced letdown, this book is objectively not a great read. It’s only 242 pages yet the first 90, a full third, comprise the introduction. That’s the page she first introduces the term “assembly theory.�� For a book that underpins its entire thesis on a new theory, it’s weird that it’s introduced so late.

Her explanations drift quite a bit. She often says she’s going to explain something but spends several pages drifting into pontification rather than explanation.

The style of the book itself is weird as well. She refers to people by their first name. Far be it from me to enforce rules of formality on someone but I find it bizarre that after introducing someone of John von Neumann’s stature, she calls him Johnny thereafter, the same way she refers to a colleague she actively works with named “Mike.��

But ultimately my criticism is that this book is confused as to whether it’s about her personal discovery and journey to understanding life, or whether it’s meant to explain the concepts. She provides uninteresting details about a lab in Glasgow, or pages referencing meta-analyses of paradigm shifts by introducing Thomas Kuhn. Overall she does this more than explaining her actual theories or attempted paradigm shift. It’s hard to tell what her goal is. The book ends abruptly with no synthesis, or conclusion as if she just decided to stop writing and move on to something else.
]]> 202104262
Deep in the hills of Appalachia, anti-android sentiment is building. Charismatic demagogue Eli Whitaker has used anger toward new labor policies that replace factory workers with androids to build a militia–and now he is recruiting child soldiers.

Part of a governmental task force, Adrian and Trey are determined to put a stop to Whitaker’s efforts. Their mission is complicated by their own shared childhood experiences with Whitaker. After an automated soldier shoots a child during a raid to protect Trey, both grapple with the role of androids and their use in combat.

Interrelated with the hunt for Whitaker, farmers Shay and Ernst struggle after they discover their GMO crop seeds have failed and caused a deadly illness in Shay. To help manage, they hire android employees: Sarah as hospice, and AG-15 to work the now-toxic fields. The couple’s relationship to the androids evolve as both humans get progressively more sick.

Timely and chilling, Wagner's nonlinear debut shares intimate narratives of loss, trauma, and survival as the emergence of artificial life intersects with state violence and political extremism in rural Appalachia.]]> 320 Erin K. Wagner 0756419344 Christian 0 to-read 3.76 2024
author: Erin K. Wagner
name: Christian
average rating: 3.76
book published: 2024
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/11/28
shelves: to-read
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]]> 205363938 A medical crisis brings one man close to death—and to love, art, and beauty—in a profound and luminous novel by award-winning author Garth Greenwell.

A poet's life is turned inside out by a sudden, wrenching pain. The pain brings him to his knees, and eventually to the ICU. Confined to bed, plunged into the dysfunctional American healthcare system, he struggles to understand what is happening to his body, as someone who has lived for many years in his mind.

This is a searching, sweeping novel set at the furthest edges of human experience, where the forces that give life value—art, memory, poetry, music, care—are thrown into sharp relief. Time expands and contracts. Sudden intimacies bloom. Small Rain surges beyond the hospital to encompass a radiant vision of human life: our shared vulnerability, the limits and possibilities of sympathy, the ideal of art and the fragile dream of America. Above all, this is a love story of the most unexpected kind.]]> 306 Garth Greenwell 0374279543 Christian 0 to-read 4.06 2024
author: Garth Greenwell
name: Christian
average rating: 4.06
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/11/16
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]]> 205673381 Franz Kafka meets Yorgos Lanthimos in this provocative new novel from one of America’s most brilliant and distinctive writers

In a speculative future, Abel, a menial worker, is called to serve in a secretive and fabled jury system. At the heart of this system is the repeat room, where a single juror, selected from hundreds of candidates, is able to inhabit the defendant’s lived experience, to see as if through their eyes.

The case to which Abel is assigned is revealed in the novel’s shocking second act. We receive a record of a boy’s broken and constrained life, a tale that reveals an illicit and passionate psycho-sexual relationship, its end as tragic as the circumstances of its conception.

Artful in its suspense, and sharp in its evocation of a byzantine and cruel bureaucracy, The Repeat Room is an exciting and pointed critique of the nature of knowledge and judgment, and a vivid framing of Ball’s absurd and nihilistic philosophy of love.]]> 256 Jesse Ball 1646221400 Christian 0 to-read 3.13 2024
author: Jesse Ball
name: Christian
average rating: 3.13
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/11/16
shelves: to-read
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]]> 206303798 In her first book since the widely acclaimed��Strangers in Their Own Land,��the National Book Award finalist and bestselling author Arlie Russell Hochschild now ventures to Appalachia, uncovering the “pride paradox�� that has given the right’s appeals such resonance. For all the efforts to understand the state of American politics and the blue/red divide, we’ve ignored what economic and cultural loss can do to pride. In Stolen Pride, Arlie Russell Hochschild argues that Donald Trump has turned lost pride into stolen pride and shame into blame, and that the result of his rhetorical alchemy has been to weaponize that shame and introduce a potent blend of anger and often violent rhetoric—undermining democracy and highlighting revenge.

Hochschild’s research drew her to Pikeville, Kentucky, in the heart of Appalachia, within the whitest and second-poorest congressional district in the nation, where its residents faced the perfect storm. The city was coal jobs had left, crushing poverty arrived, and a deadly drug crisis struck the region more powerfully than anywhere else in the nation. Although Pikeville had been in the political center thirty years ago, by 2016, 80 percent of the district’s population voted for Donald Trump. Hochschild’s brilliant exploration of how the town responded in 2017, when a white nationalist march came to town—a rehearsal for the deadly “unite the right�� march that would take place in Charlottesville, Virginia, just four months later—takes us deep inside a community that defies stereotypes.

In Stolen Pride, Hochschild—whose previous book,��Strangers in Their Own Land, was heralded by the��New York Times��as one of a small handful of books to read to understand Trump and the 2016 election—focuses on a group at the center of the shifting political blue-collar men. Long conversations over six years with mayors and felons, clerks and shopkeepers, road workers and teachers, ex-coal miners, and recovering addicts form the core of the book, movingly introducing readers to real people living deep within the political storm.

Hochschild’s great gift is to decode the emotional narratives that demagogues can speak to and lay bare the pain that lies beneath the rage. And in some of the voices she listens to, Hochschild hears an alternative to the inchoate anger, as she and her subjects imagine a way we might build bridges and move forward.]]> 400 Arlie Russell Hochschild 1620976463 Christian 0 to-read 4.04 2024
author: Arlie Russell Hochschild
name: Christian
average rating: 4.04
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/11/14
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 204294839 How Big Tech is taking advantage of us, how AI is making it��worse, and how we can create a thriving, AI-positive world.On balance, will AI help humanity or harm it? AI could revolutionize science, medicine, and technology, and deliver us a world of abundance and better health. Or it could be a disaster, leading to the downfall of democracy, or even our extinction. In Taming Silicon Valley, Gary Marcus, one of the most trusted voices in AI, explains that we still have a choice. And that the decisions we make now about AI will shape our next century. In this short but powerful manifesto, Marcus explains how Big Tech is taking advantage of us, how AI could make things much worse, and, most importantly, what we can do to safeguard our democracy, our society, and our future.Marcus explains the potential—and potential risks—of AI in the clearest possible terms and how Big Tech has effectively captured policymakers. He begins by laying out what is lacking in current AI, what the greatest risks of AI are, and how Big Tech has been playing both the public and the government, before digging into why the US government has thus far been ineffective at reining in Big Tech. He then offers real tools for readers, including eight suggestions for what a coherent AI policy should like—from data rights to layered AI oversight to meaningful tax reform—and closes with how ordinary citizens can push for what is so desperately needed.Taming Silicon Valley is both a primer on how AI has gotten to its problematic present state and a book of activism in the tradition of��Abbie Hoffman’s Steal This Book and Thomas Paine’s Common Sense. It is a deeply important book for our perilous historical moment that every concerned citizen must read.]]> 240 Gary F. Marcus 0262551063 Christian 0 to-read 3.99
author: Gary F. Marcus
name: Christian
average rating: 3.99
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/11/14
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]]> 209349509 A visionary reexamination of the value of privacy in today’s hypermediated world—not just as a political right but as the key to a life worth living.The portion of our lives that is not being surveilled and turned into data diminishes each day. We are given the chance to configure privacy settings on our devices and social media platforms, but we know our efforts pale in comparison to the scale of surveillance capitalism and algorithmic manipulation. In our hyperconnected era, many have begun to wonder whether it is still possible to live a private life, or whether it is no longer worth fighting for.The Right to Oblivion argues incisively and persuasively that we still can and should strive for privacy, though for different reasons than we might think. Recent years have seen heated debate in the realm of law and technology about why privacy matters, often focusing on how personal data breaches amount to violations of individual freedom. Yet as Lowry Pressly shows, the very terms of this debate have undermined our understanding of privacy’s real value. In a novel philosophical account, Pressly insists that privacy isn’t simply a right to be protected but a tool for making life meaningful.Privacy deepens our relationships with others as well as ourselves, reinforcing our capacities for agency, trust, play, self-discovery, and growth. Without privacy, the world would grow shallow, lonely, and inhospitable. Drawing inspiration from the likes of Hannah Arendt, Jorge Luis Borges, and a range of contemporary artists, Pressly shows why we all need a refuge from the not a place to hide, but a psychic space beyond the confines of a digital world in which the individual is treated as mere data.]]> 240 Lowry Pressly 067426052X Christian 0 to-read 3.92
author: Lowry Pressly
name: Christian
average rating: 3.92
book published:
rating: 0
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date added: 2024/11/14
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 199798006
As a young, queer couple who flip houses, Charlie and Eve can’t believe the killer deal they’ve just gotten on an old house in a picturesque neighborhood. As they’re working in the house one day, there’s a knock on the door. A man stands there with his family, claiming to have lived there years before and asking if it would be alright if he showed his kids around. People pleaser to a fault, Eve lets them in.

As soon as the strangers enter their home, inexplicable things start happening, including the family’s youngest child going missing and a ghostly presence materializing in the basement. Even more weird, the family can’t seem to take the hint that their visit should be over. And when Charlie suddenly vanishes, Eve slowly loses her grip on reality. Something is terribly wrong with the house and with the visiting family—or is Eve just imagining things?

This unputdownable and spine-tingling novel “is like quicksand: the further you delve into its pages, the more immobilized you become by a spiral of terror. We Used to Live Here will haunt you even after you have finished it�� (Agustina Bazterrica, author of Tender Is the Flesh).]]> 312 Marcus Kliewer 1982198788 Christian 0 to-read 3.67 2024
author: Marcus Kliewer
name: Christian
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/11/14
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 2113260
Eddie Russett is an above-average Red who dreams of moving up the ladder. Until he is sent to the Outer Fringes where he meets Jane - a lowly Grey with an uncontrollable temper and a desire to see him killed.

For Eddie, it's love at first sight. But his infatuation will lead him to discover that all is not as it seems in a world where everything that looks black and white is really shades of grey...]]> 400 Jasper Fforde 0670019631 Christian 0 to-read 4.15 2009
author: Jasper Fforde
name: Christian
average rating: 4.15
book published: 2009
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/11/14
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 198276006 I Cheerfully Refuse is the tale of Rainy, an aspiring musician setting sail on Lake Superior in search of his departed, deeply beloved, bookselling wife. An endearing bear of an Orphean narrator, he seeks refuge in the harbors, fogs, and remote islands of the inland sea. After encountering lunatic storms and rising corpses from the warming depths, he eventually lands to find an increasingly desperate and illiterate people, a malignant billionaire ruling class, a crumbled infrastructure, and a lawless society. As his guileless nature begins to make an inadvertent rebel of him, Rainy’s private quest for the love of his life grows into something wider and wilder, sweeping up friends and foes alike in his wake.]]> 336 Leif Enger 0802162932 Christian 0 to-read 3.96 2024
author: Leif Enger
name: Christian
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2024
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/11/14
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 158875813
On a dark, wet evening in Dublin, scientist and mother-of-four Eilish Stack answers her front door to find the GNSB on her step. Two officers from Ireland’s newly formed secret police are here to interrogate her husband, a trade unionist.

Ireland is falling apart. The country is in the grip of a government turning towards tyranny and Eilish can only watch helplessly as the world she knew disappears. When first her husband and then her eldest son vanish, Eilish finds herself caught within the nightmare logic of a collapsing society.

How far will she go to save her family? And what �� or who �� is she willing to leave behind?

Exhilarating, terrifying and propulsive, Prophet Song is a work of breathtaking originality, offering a devastating vision of a country at war and a deeply human portrait of a mother’s fight to hold her family together.]]> 259 Paul Lynch Christian 5
I’m sure many readers will find a parallel between what happens in this novel’s Ireland and what we fear is happening in many other floundering democracies. But what I took most from it was the visceral experience of Eilish as a parent tasked with figuring out what to do for her family. I found myself so frustrated by her stubbornness not to leave. But the author does an amazing job getting me out of my privileged position where I can easily say “I’d have left immediately!�� It’s not so simple. It’s hard enough for her to manage the divergent directions her family members all take, let alone have the prescience to know how the war will unfold. So while I spent most of the book frustrated by the mother’s decisions, I think I finished seeing myself doing nothing different than her.

There’s also such great contrast shown between the crumbling of the state juxtaposed against the normalcy of school, shopping, finding a job, and nature itself. It’s those contrasts the author weaves throughout which make this is book one you must experience.]]> 4.03 2023
author: Paul Lynch
name: Christian
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2023
rating: 5
read at: 2024/11/13
date added: 2024/11/13
shelves:
review:
There’s an uneasy unfolding of the plot that reminds me of Kafka. The civil war Eilish finds herself navigating her family through seems to happen so suddenly and everything she does is met with confusion. The lack of quotes for dialog makes the book difficult to read but also adds to this feeling of confusion.

I’m sure many readers will find a parallel between what happens in this novel’s Ireland and what we fear is happening in many other floundering democracies. But what I took most from it was the visceral experience of Eilish as a parent tasked with figuring out what to do for her family. I found myself so frustrated by her stubbornness not to leave. But the author does an amazing job getting me out of my privileged position where I can easily say “I’d have left immediately!�� It’s not so simple. It’s hard enough for her to manage the divergent directions her family members all take, let alone have the prescience to know how the war will unfold. So while I spent most of the book frustrated by the mother’s decisions, I think I finished seeing myself doing nothing different than her.

There’s also such great contrast shown between the crumbling of the state juxtaposed against the normalcy of school, shopping, finding a job, and nature itself. It’s those contrasts the author weaves throughout which make this is book one you must experience.
]]> 214986196 From the New York Times bestselling author of Mostly Dead Things, a sparkling and funny new novel of entertainment, ambition, art, and love.

Cherry Hendricks might be down on her luck, but she can write the book on what makes something funny: she’s a professional clown who creates raucous, zany fun at gigs all over Orlando. Between her clowning and her shifts at an aquarium store for extra cash, she’s always hustling. Not to mention balancing her judgmental mother, her messy love life, and her equally messy community of fellow performers.

Things start looking up when Cherry meets Margot the Magnificent—a much older lesbian magician—who seems to have worked out the lines between art, business, and life, and has a slick, successful career to prove it. With Margot’s mentorship and industry connections, Cherry is sure to take her art to the next level. Plus, Margot is sexy as hell. It’s not long before Cherry must decide how much she’s willing to risk for Margot and for her own explosive new act—and what kind of clown she wants to be under her suit.

Equal parts bravado, tenderness, and humor, and bursting with misfits, magicians, musicians, and mimes, Stop Me If You've Heard This One is a masterpiece of comedic fiction that asks big questions about art and performance, friendship and community, and the importance of timing in jokes and in life.]]> 272 Kristen Arnett 0593719778 Christian 0 to-read 3.67 2025
author: Kristen Arnett
name: Christian
average rating: 3.67
book published: 2025
rating: 0
read at:
date added: 2024/11/10
shelves: to-read
review:

]]> 62686859 An electrifying introduction to complexity theory, the science of how complex systems behave—from cells to human beings, ecosystems, the known universe and beyond—that profoundly reframes our understanding and illuminates our interconnectedness.

Nothing in the universe is more complex than life. Throughout the skies, in oceans, and across lands, life is endlessly on the move. In its myriad forms—from cells to human beings, social structures, and ecosystems--life is open-ended, evolving, unpredictable, yet adaptive and self-sustaining. Complexity theory addresses the mysteries that animate science, philosophy, and metaphysics: how this teeming array of existence, from the infinitesimal to the infinite, is in fact a seamless living whole and what our place, as conscious beings, is within it. Physician, scientist, and philosopher Neil Theise makes accessible this “theory of being,�� one of the pillars of modern science, and its holistic view of human existence. He notes the surprising underlying connections within a universe that is itself one vast complex system—between ant colonies and the growth of forests, cancer and economic bubbles, murmurations of starlings and crowds walking down the street.

The implications of complexity theory are profound, providing insight into everything from the permeable boundaries of our bodies to the nature of consciousness. Notes on Complexity is an invitation to trade our limited, individualistic view for the expansive perspective of a universe that is dynamic, cohesive, and alive—a whole greater than the sum of its parts. This takes us to the exhilarating frontiers of human knowledge and in the process restores wonder and meaning to our experience of the everyday.]]> 224 Neil Theise 1954118252 Christian 3 3.96 2023
author: Neil Theise
name: Christian
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2024/11/10
date added: 2024/11/10
shelves:
review:
The first half was fantastic, distilling down the key components of complexity quite well for a layperson like myself. As the book shifts into quantum mechanics it gets pretty challenging to follow but I’ll chalk that up to the inherent density of the subject matter. But when he delves into consciousness and religion, I got completely lost and disinterested. I couldn’t find the thread between the first half and his discussion of religions. Maybe it’s simply too much to accomplish in one book. Or maybe I should’ve gotten the hint based on the title of the book that it’s “notes�� on complexity rather than a unified thesis (which probably would require a book 3x the length to properly bring the reader along).
]]> 52838315 From the Academy Award®–winning actor, an unconventional memoir filled with raucous stories, outlaw wisdom, and lessons learned the hard way about living with greater satisfaction.

I’ve been in this life for fifty years, been trying to work out its riddle for forty-two, and been keeping diaries of clues to that riddle for the last thirty-five. Notes about successes and failures, joys and sorrows, things that made me marvel, and things that made me laugh out loud. How to be fair. How to have less stress. How to have fun. How to hurt people less. How to get hurt less. How to be a good man. How to have meaning in life. How to be more me.

Recently, I worked up the courage to sit down with those diaries. I found stories I experienced, lessons I learned and forgot, poems, prayers, prescriptions, beliefs about what matters, some great photographs, and a whole bunch of bumper stickers. I found a reliable theme, an approach to living that gave me more satisfaction, at the time, and still: If you know how, and when, to deal with life’s challenges - how to get relative with the inevitable - you can enjoy a state of success I call “catching greenlights.��

So I took a one-way ticket to the desert and wrote this book: an album, a record, a story of my life so far. This is fifty years of my sights and seens, felts and figured-outs, cools and shamefuls. Graces, truths, and beauties of brutality. Getting away withs, getting caughts, and getting wets while trying to dance between the raindrops.

Hopefully, it’s medicine that tastes good, a couple of aspirin instead of the infirmary, a spaceship to Mars without needing your pilot’s license, going to church without having to be born again, and laughing through the tears.

It’s a love letter. To life.

It’s also a guide to catching more greenlights - and to realizing that the yellows and reds eventually turn green too.

Good luck.]]> 289 Matthew McConaughey 0593139135 Christian 5 4.21 2020
author: Matthew McConaughey
name: Christian
average rating: 4.21
book published: 2020
rating: 5
read at: 2024/11/08
date added: 2024/11/08
shelves:
review:

]]> 57070599 Can reading a book make you more rational? Can it help us understand why there is so much irrationality in the world? These are the goals of Rationality, Steven Pinker's follow-up to Enlightenment Now (Bill Gates's new favorite book of all time").


In the 21st century, humanity is reaching new heights of scientific understanding--and at the same time appears to be losing its mind. How can a species that developed vaccines for Covid-19 in less than a year produce so much fake news, medical quackery, and conspiracy theorizing?

Pinker rejects the cynical clich�� that humans are an irrational species--cavemen out of time saddled with biases, fallacies, and illusions. After all, we discovered the laws of nature, lengthened and enriched our lives, and discovered the benchmarks for rationality itself. Instead, he explains that we think in ways that are sensible in the low-tech contexts in which we spend most of our lives, but fail to take advantage of the powerful tools of reasoning our best thinkers have discovered over the millennia: logic, critical thinking, probability, correlation and causation, and optimal ways to update beliefs and commit to choices individually and with others. These tools are not a standard part of our educational curricula, and have never been presented clearly and entertainingly in a single book--until now.

Rationality also explores its opposite: how the rational pursuit of self-interest, sectarian solidarity, and uplifting mythology by individuals can add up to crippling irrationality in a society. Collective rationality depends on norms that are explicitly designed to promote objectivity and truth.

Rationality matters. It leads to better choices in our lives and in the public sphere, and is the ultimate driver of social justice and moral progress.. Brimming with insight and humour, Rationality will enlighten, inspire, and empower.
]]> 432 Steven Pinker 0525561994 Christian 3 skimmed 3.79 2021
author: Steven Pinker
name: Christian
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2021
rating: 3
read at: 2024/11/03
date added: 2024/11/03
shelves: skimmed
review:

]]> 51924687
The limits of certainty demonstrate the power of human judgment over artificial intelligence. In most critical decisions there can be no forecasts or probability distributions on which we might sensibly rely. Instead of inventing numbers to fill the gaps in our knowledge, we should adopt business, political, and personal strategies that will be robust to alternative futures and resilient to unpredictable events. Within the security of such a robust and resilient reference narrative, uncertainty can be embraced, because it is the source of creativity, excitement, and profit.]]> 544 John Kay 1324004789 Christian 3
As I read other reader comments on this book I became convinced I’d gotten the central thesis and expending more time reading reference upon reference wasn’t a particularly useful endeavor.]]> 3.86 2020
author: John Kay
name: Christian
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2020
rating: 3
read at: 2024/11/03
date added: 2024/11/03
shelves:
review:
I typically don’t mind when authors repeat their points because it helps new concepts stick. And not being an economist myself, radical uncertainty was certainly new to me. But my problem with the book is that the authors didn’t really seem to write it for readers. It was written like an academic article where the key points are shrouded in endless examples and citations. I found it incredibly challenging to pull out what the takeaway is in any given chapter. Even as I skipped to the end, their closing chapters continue bringing in new references.

As I read other reader comments on this book I became convinced I’d gotten the central thesis and expending more time reading reference upon reference wasn’t a particularly useful endeavor.
]]> 48813565 A roadmap for software product teams on designing a great user experience

There was a time when companies could get away with mediocre product experiences. But not any more. Today, consumers expect products that delight. Once someone begins using a digital product, their unique experience unfolds. How you shape that experience is integral to customer satisfaction and future sales. The Data-Driven Product: How to Design, Build, and Evolve Software Customers Can't Live Without guides product teams and their leaders in designing a delightful experience directly inside their web and mobile applications. The book explains why some software products fail to measure up in the eyes of the users--and how to avoid that fate.

This book helps product managers, user experience designers, team leaders, and other stakeholders create software their customers love to use. It provides:

A holistic view of the quantitative and qualitative insights teams need to make better decisions and shape better product experiences A guide to setting goals for product success and measuring progress toward meeting them A playbook for incorporating sales and marketing activities, service and support, as well as onboarding and education into the product Strategies for soliciting, organizing and prioritizing feedback from customers and other stakeholders; and how to use those inputs to create an effective product roadmap The Data-Driven Product was written by a co-founder of Pendo--a SaaS company and innovator in providing software for product managers. The book reflects the author's passion and dedication to sharing what it takes to build great products.]]> 272 Todd Olson 1119660874 Christian 3 owned 3.80
author: Todd Olson
name: Christian
average rating: 3.80
book published:
rating: 3
read at: 2024/10/30
date added: 2024/10/31
shelves: owned
review:
Definitely more of a product management book than an organizational book. I'd view this more as an addendum to Inspired by Marty Cagan than a book about building product organizations. With that lens, it's quite useful for those new to the field or 0-3 years removed from college.
]]> 39792083 336 Chris Risdon 1933820748 Christian 4 owned, design, skimmed 4.25
author: Chris Risdon
name: Christian
average rating: 4.25
book published:
rating: 4
read at: 2024/10/28
date added: 2024/10/28
shelves: owned, design, skimmed
review:
I’ve far passed up the point in my career where I’d find this useful but I still like to scan methods books to see how the field evolves and whether I’d recommend them to newer designers. This is a book I wish I’d had earlier in my career. The balance between concept and practical workshops you can use is immensely helpful for newer designers and researchers at large organizations. I think it will be particularly helpful for those moving into more senior roles and/or spearheading design processes.
]]> 123636870
A young woman moves from the place of her birth to the remote northern country of her forebears to be housekeeper to her brother, whose wife has recently left him.��

Soon after her arrival, a series of inexplicable events occurs - collective bovine hysteria; the demise of a ewe and her nearly born lamb; a local dog's phantom pregnancy; a potato blight. She notices that the local suspicion about incomers in general seems to be directed with some intensity at her and she senses a mounting threat that lies 'just beyond the garden gate.' And as she feels the hostility growing, pressing at the edges of her brother's property, she fears that, should the rumblings in the town gather themselves into a more defined shape, who knows what might happen, what one might be capable of doing.

With a sharp, lyrical voice, Sarah Bernstein powerfully explores questions of complicity and power, displacement and inheritance. Study for Obedience is a finely tuned, unsettling novel that confirms Bernstein as one of the most exciting voices of her generation.]]> 192 Sarah Bernstein 1039009069 Christian 1 3.02 2023
author: Sarah Bernstein
name: Christian
average rating: 3.02
book published: 2023
rating: 1
read at: 2024/10/27
date added: 2024/10/27
shelves:
review:
Probably the least enjoyable novel I’ve ever read. I’m certain I missed something but I truly could find nothing redeemable, much less understandable in the plot.
]]> 216238758 Sell your tech (without getting technical).

B2B tech marketing is confusing buyers with technical jargon and drowning them in meaningless buzzwords that leave them overwhelmed (and not all that interested in buying). When everyone’s using the same tired lingo, how do you cut through the noise and show buyers your value? You get punchy.

In Make It Punchy, tech messaging expert Emma Stratton shows you how and why you need to leave all the jargon behind. How to get real with buyers about why your technology matters to them. How to use language that resonates on a human level. And how to move away from how the tech works and shift buyers�� minds to how it can solve their problems.

This practical guide is full of helpful frameworks and real-world examples that break down the process of B2B messaging step by step—from the first strategy session to writing to implementation. Emma leads you through exercises that help you understand your customers, engage your creativity, and get your team involved. She shows you how to break down your messaging into a clear, concise format that works for everything from a single product launch to a large-scale initiative.

With Make It Punchy, you’ll get proven techniques to share a simple, concise story about your tech solution with buyers—and finally stand out from the competition.]]> 212 Emma Stratton 1774584085 Christian 5 4.67
author: Emma Stratton
name: Christian
average rating: 4.67
book published:
rating: 5
read at: 2024/10/27
date added: 2024/10/27
shelves:
review:
This is the most useful and concise book I’ve read on messaging. Where a lot of other writers on the subject fail to do is make messaging work for “cold start�� companies. Stratton handles this well and I appreciated that she’s had to do messaging for similar companies because she acknowledges you may have no customers to start with.
]]> 150246129
It’s not always easy to tell when you’re dealing with a narcissist. One day they draw you in with their confidence and charisma, the next they gaslight you, wreck your self-confidence, and leave you wondering, What could I have done differently?

As Dr. Ramani Durvasula reveals in It's Not You , the answer absolutely nothing. Just as a tiger can’t change its stripes, a narcissist won’t stop manipulating and invalidating you. To heal in the aftermath of their abuse and protect yourself from future harm, you first have to accept that you are not to blame.

Deeply compassionate and revelatory, It’s Not You examines how narcissists hijack our wellbeing and offers a healing path forward. Drawing on more than 20 years of studying, teaching, and helping clients navigate the landscape of narcissism, Dr. Durvasula unpacks the oft-misunderstood personality, showing how to identify the telltale signs that you may be dealing with a narcissist and protect yourself from their toxic influence. Along the way, you’ll learn how to become gaslight resistant, chip away at the trauma bonds that keep us stuck in these cycles, grieve the losses, create realistic boundaries, learn the fine art of discernment, and recover your sense of self after years of invalidation.

Healing and thriving after or even during a narcissistic relationship can be challenging, but it is possible. It's Not You shows that the first step is to stop trying to change the narcissistic person, stop blaming yourself, and start giving yourself permission to foster your autonomy and sense of self outside of this relationship.]]> 368 Ramani Durvasula 0593492625 Christian 4
The book has to cover many different types of relationships so I can’t expect it to cover all types, but I do wish some time had been spent on co-parenting. ]]> 4.64 2024
author: Ramani Durvasula
name: Christian
average rating: 4.64
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/10/26
date added: 2024/10/26
shelves:
review:
There are many books on the topic so if you’ve read one then this may not offer anything new. For me, it was my first and quite eye-opening. It’s challenging to write a review without going into personal detail but suffice it to say that this is a Rosetta Stone for understanding the last several years of my life and understanding how to move forward.

The book has to cover many different types of relationships so I can’t expect it to cover all types, but I do wish some time had been spent on co-parenting.
]]> 72173542 240 Rob Cross 1647823978 Christian 3 skimmed 3.38 2023
author: Rob Cross
name: Christian
average rating: 3.38
book published: 2023
rating: 3
read at: 2024/10/22
date added: 2024/10/22
shelves: skimmed
review:
The framework was helpful to think through and oddly just a couple chapters will probably stick with me more than entire books do. The detailed breakdown of their 14 proposed microstresses wasn’t entirely helpful and often too vague to be translated into real life. I actually believe if you read a couple chapters, you’ll learn enough to witness the effects of microstresses in your life and decide the right course for solving them on your own; the solutions are common sense.
]]> 30780674 Author of cult classics The Pumpkin Plan and The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur offers a simple, counterintuitive cash management solution that will help small businesses break out of the doom spiral and achieve instant profitability.

Conventional accounting uses the logical (albeit, flawed) formula: Sales - Expenses = Profit. The problem is, businesses are run by humans, and humans aren't always logical. Serial entrepreneur Mike Michalowicz has developed a behavioral approach to accounting to flip the formula: Sales - Profit = Expenses. Just as the most effective weight loss strategy is to limit portions by using smaller plates, Michalowicz shows that by taking profit first and apportioning only what remains for expenses, entrepreneurs will transform their businesses from cash-eating monsters to profitable cash cows. Using Michalowicz's Profit First system, readers will learn that:

- Following 4 simple principles can simplify accounting and make it easier to manage a profitable business by looking at bank account balances.
- A small, profitable business can be worth much more than a large business surviving on its top line.
- Businesses that attain early and sustained profitability have a better shot at achieving long-term growth.

With dozens of case studies, practical, step-by-step advice, and his signature sense of humor, Michalowicz has the game-changing roadmap for any entrepreneur to make money they always dreamed of.]]> 224 Mike Michalowicz Christian 4 owned 4.25 2014
author: Mike Michalowicz
name: Christian
average rating: 4.25
book published: 2014
rating: 4
read at: 2024/10/22
date added: 2024/10/22
shelves: owned
review:

]]> 199532033 Award-winning author Willy Vlautin explores loneliness, art, addiction, regret, love, and hard-won empathy in this poignant novel—his most personal to date—that captures the life of a journeyman musician unable to escape the tragedies of his past.

Al Ward lives on an isolated mining claim in the high desert of central Nevada fifty miles from the nearest town. A grizzled man in his sixties, he survives on canned soup, instant coffee, and memories of his ex-wife, friends and family he’s lost, and his life as a touring musician. Hampered by insomnia, bouts of anxiety, and a chronic lethargy that keeps him from moving back to town, Al finds himself teetering on the edge of madness and running out of reasons to go on—until a horse arrives on his doorstep: nameless, blind, and utterly helpless.

Al hopes the horse will vanish as mysteriously as he appeared. Yet the animal remains, leaving him in a conundrum. Is the animal real, or a phantom conjured from imagination? As Al contemplates the horse’s existence—and what, if anything, he can do—his thoughts are interspersed with memories of his life as a musician, from the moment his mother’s part-time boyfriend gifts him a 1959 butterscotch blonde Telecaster, to the day his life as a traveling musician begins. He joins various bands—all who perform his songs once they discover his talent–playing casinos, truck stops, clubs, and bars. He falls in love, and finds pockets of companionship and minor success along the way. Never close to stardom or financial success, he continues as a journeyman for decades until alcoholism and a heartbreaking tragedy lead him to the isolation of the barren Nevada desert.

A poignant meditation on art, addiction, loneliness, heartbreak, and the reality of life on the road in smalltime bands, The Horse is a beautiful, haunting tale from an author working at the height of his powers.]]> 194 Willy Vlautin 0063346575 Christian 4 4.11 2024
author: Willy Vlautin
name: Christian
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2024
rating: 4
read at: 2024/10/19
date added: 2024/10/19
shelves:
review:

]]> 37638098 An insider's account of Apple's creative process during the golden years of Steve Jobs.

Hundreds of millions of people use Apple products every day; several thousand work on Apple's campus in Cupertino, California; but only a handful sit at the drawing board. Creative Selection recounts the life of one of the few who worked behind the scenes, a highly-respected software engineer who worked in the final years the Steve Jobs era--the Golden Age of Apple.

Ken Kocienda offers an inside look at Apple's creative process. For fifteen years, he was on the ground floor of the company as a specialist, directly responsible for experimenting with novel user interface concepts and writing powerful, easy-to-use software for products including the iPhone, the iPad, and the Safari web browser. His stories explain the symbiotic relationship between software and product development for those who have never dreamed of programming a computer, and reveal what it was like to work on the cutting edge of technology at one of the world's most admired companies.

Kocienda shares moments of struggle and success, crisis and collaboration, illuminating each with lessons learned over his Apple career. He introduces the essential elements of innovation--inspiration, collaboration, craft, diligence, decisiveness, taste, and empathy--and uses these as a lens through which to understand productive work culture.

An insider's tale of creativity and innovation at Apple, Creative Selection shows readers how a small group of people developed an evolutionary design model, and how they used this methodology to make groundbreaking and intuitive software which countless millions use every day.]]> 264 Ken Kocienda 1250194466 Christian 2 did-not-finish
But the kicker is not only that he never really discusses what this design process (which is curiously pretty devoid of designers). Rather, the problem is there’s no focus and at worst he contradicts himself on Apple’s process:
��3. Doing the necessary grunt work and never resorting to shortcuts or half measures.�� (Pg. 4)
Then:
“He cut corners to highlight the potential of this code…And it worked.�� (pg. 61).
Then follows that stunning contradiction with a highly relevant comparison to “Singing in the Rain.��
Oof.

]]> 4.02 2018
author: Ken Kocienda
name: Christian
average rating: 4.02
book published: 2018
rating: 2
read at: 2024/10/13
date added: 2024/10/13
shelves: did-not-finish
review:
Disappointing to finally get around to this book and it doesn’t deliver on anything it promises. The author’s had a stellar career but man there’s just no book here. Example: chapter 1 is 32 pages long and only covers him giving a software demo of an iPad keyboard to Steve Jobs. Oof.

But the kicker is not only that he never really discusses what this design process (which is curiously pretty devoid of designers). Rather, the problem is there’s no focus and at worst he contradicts himself on Apple’s process:
��3. Doing the necessary grunt work and never resorting to shortcuts or half measures.�� (Pg. 4)
Then:
“He cut corners to highlight the potential of this code…And it worked.�� (pg. 61).
Then follows that stunning contradiction with a highly relevant comparison to “Singing in the Rain.��
Oof.


]]> 157981748 Alternate cover edition of ISBN 9780593243916.

Who and what are supercommunicators? They're the people who can steer a conversation to a successful conclusion. They are able to talk about difficult topics without giving offence. They know how to make others feel at ease and share what they think. They're brilliant facilitators and decision-guiders. How do they do it?

In this groundbreaking book, Charles Duhigg unravels the secrets of the supercommunicators to reveal the art - and the science - of successful communication. He unpicks the different types of everyday conversation and pinpoints why some go smoothly while others swiftly fall apart. He reveals the conversational questions and gambits that bring people together. And he shows how even the most tricky of encounters can be turned around. In the process, he shows why a CIA operative was able to win over a reluctant spy, how a member of a jury got his fellow jurors to view an open-and-shut case differently, and what a doctor found they needed to do to engage with a vaccine sceptic.

Above all, he reveals the techniques we can all master to successfully connect with others, however tricky the circumstances. Packed with fascinating case studies and drawing on cutting-edge research, this book will change the way you think about what you say, and how you say it.]]> 320 Charles Duhigg Christian 3 skimmed 4.00 2024
author: Charles Duhigg
name: Christian
average rating: 4.00
book published: 2024
rating: 3
read at: 2024/10/13
date added: 2024/10/13
shelves: skimmed
review:
Good intro book to communicating. I found the premise a little strange for Duhigg though. He starts saying he failed as a manager so he sought how to communicate better. I don’t know that it warranted an entire book on the subject when most new managers working for any semi-large company would get training basically telling them the same thing he does in this book. And frankly, I know managerial training can feel like the lamest thing to experience in the moment but it’s far more effective at teaching leadership than reading a book.
]]>