Recently in Books Category

I just finished up the audio version of Malcolm Gladwell's recent book, Outliers, and I found it really interesting.  I can see why Gladwell's current book has been taken with some controversy, he basically tries to debunk the hard work and toil, rags to riches success will pay scenarios that is a mantra to many, and a particularly familiar one to Americans... it is his theory that success is as much part luck as it is hard work.

The book is a collection of really interesting stories, to me they're stories that are plausible and fascinating, and they kept my interest.  Nothing truly surprised me (well one thing did, a statistic that I mention later), but a lot of things made say, "huh, that sort of makes sense."  I think it's up to the reader to take it at face value or not.

I was particularly struck by the fun connections Gladwell made to birthdays and success.  I even found myself relating with the connection that children held back a year from starting school do better than children who start school right away...  My birthday falling in September made me one of those children when my education began, and I was not in the category of children held back a year, making me the youngest in my class.  I always wondered why two of my good friends, both in a class below me and weeks older than I was were particularly smarter, honor students, and one Salutatorian of his class.  A lot of my friends are smart, I never felt jealous of this situation, I was pretty well aware of my strengths at a young age and recognizing I didn't have have to be intelligent at everything happened to be one of them... to me then it was still an interesting curiosity, and now it sort of makes sense, they were just given a different opportunity than I was.  I was also shocked to discover that only 11% of children in my category, the children who are not held a year, even attend college, something I had done, which puts me in this small group of college graduates that I was never aware existed.  Being the youngest in my class was a struggle, school in general was a struggle for me, and always has been, and neither one of these things were ever overlooked by me... I suppose I just never made the connections between them.  I do know other situations certainly make up for any disadvantages I may have been handed by being the youngest in my class, and that some combination of this and some combination of other things make me who I am, and somebody I've always been proud to be.  It doesn't make me better off or worse off, it's just like little puzzle pieces that fall into place, you feel better having some insight you didn't have before.

The other story I was interested in was the opening on cultural heritage and the settlers of Kentucky.  This fascinated me mostly because the lineage followed very closely to my own.  My father's side of the family migrated from the British Isles then to Virginia and settled in Kentucky about the same time.  I'm not sure if they were caught up in any of the feuding mentioned in the book (but now I'm fascinated to know for sure!) but it definitely gave me a different perspective of what life might have been like for my family and my own cultural heritage.  The point in the book is that these settlers have a cultural legacy of honor that even today is intrinsically followed by those living in the South, despite modern circumstances.  Now of course one branch of my father's family migrated north, to Toledo, starting with my Great Grandfather as well as my Great Grandmother, so I did not grow up in the South, but I wonder how much of that culture of honor is present in me, or how growing up in the North shaped it differently.  I do find these things quite fascinating to think about! 

The stories in the book are success stories told in a way you don't hear the stories told, and for me at least they made me think (of course two of which did hit particularly close to personal experience so that could've had a lot of reason for that).  I did enjoy the audio book version of this one, it was read by Malcolm Gladwell and there was also a small interview at the end of the book.  This book won't give you any answers about success, I'm not sure that's what it sets out to do, but it might make you think about it differently than you did before.

Just a little cross-posting, I wrote a book review for Gene Smith's book on tagging over on the Refresh Detroit blog.  If the topic interests you be sure to check out the review and the book (don't want to spoil the end of the review, but the book is recommended!)

Refresh Detroit >> Tagging:  People Powered Metadata for the Social Web

I initially wrote it as an assignment for my Information Architecture class last semester, but pared it down some for the blog.  We'll see if my last semester lends itself to doing more things like this, hopefully my schedule won't be so bad with both of my classes being online.  I do want to have more time to read again!

There's a lot of reasons to hate Twitter these days, but I'm a believer in Twitter and I feel there's just as many reasons to love it.  Twitter is a great communication tool (when it works), I also think there's ways to use Twitter as a productivity tool that will probably never be beat for me.  Bkkeepr is only one of these services using the Twitter API that I've been trying out lately, but it's simply a mobile book tracking (and bookmark) tool that you update using Twitter.

Just use a bookmark, you're probably saying.  I do.  But, here's why this is useful to me.  I borrow tons of books from the library, I don't usually read all of them before they have to go back for holds, but I do start them.  I request them again to continue reading but usually end up with 4 or 5 post it notes with pages numbers written on them.  With Bkkeepr I can keep track of where I stopped in those books on one page (no more paper, woo hoo!)  I can update that page easily using Twitter direct messages.

The profile page is extremely simple to follow.  I'm currently only reading one book, but my profile page has a few entries for the pages I've stopped at along the way.  I can start as many books as I want though.  I can also tell bkkeepr when I've finished a book.

I also like the badge for bkkeepr.  It's just a simple text badge, no fancy formatting or crazy logos.  I might add it to my sidebar just because it's so simple.

There's links included on title pages to conveniently add them to your other favorite book tracking sites like Goodreads or LibraryThing.

Twitter's API has allowed people to come up with some amazingly unique and simple tools.  The mobile capabilities of Twitter have helped some of us find some creative ways to manage our thoughts, time, and assets.  It's also the reason why I can't give up on Twitter quite yet.

I have way too many books going right now, but I started reading this one at work and I'm enjoying it so far. Options: The Secret Life of Steve Jobs, a parody by the fake Steve Jobs is hilarious. I think fans and non-fans of Apple will certainly enjoy this book.

Technorati Tags:book, options, steve jobs, fake steve jobs, parody, review
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I can understand if Scholastic is a bit upset about the photographs of the last Harry Potter book ending up on BitTorrent. I was even a bit upset, and I hope they find who did it and prosecute the hell out of them! In addition to shutting down the material on the BitTorrent site, though, they are also trying to silence anybody who blogged or reported the story, even if they did not post a direct link to where the book can be found. TechCrunch has a story there, I'm sure we'll be seeing more of these popping up across the internet in the next few days.

But really this is just a bullying (albeit very polite bullying) tactic by the publisher to try to stop word spreading that the book, like almost all popular media today, is available free on BitTorrent for those who choose to steal it. They're trying to shoot the messenger, and this kind of stuff has a chilling effect on free speech.

Technorati Tags:scholastic, bittorrent, harry potter, harry potter book, book, harry potter and the deathly hallows, deathly hallows, free speece, censorship
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Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything

Woo Hoo! I had ordered it to make sure the library got it and it came today. I was also excited that they ordered 4 copies...usually when I request books to purchase I'm lucky to get them to get more than one for the system. I don't even care that I'm reading about 3 other books right now, I can't wait much longer to read this one!

Technorati : book, books, mass collaboration, wikinomics

The Decency Wars: The Campaign to Cleanse American Culture

This book came out last month, I saw a review of it in one of the library catalogs we get and I ordered it immediately. I was so excited to get it that I dropped everything else I was reading just to read this.

I loved it too! From the jacket cover:

In The Decency Wars, First Amendment specialist Frederick S. Lane examines America's changing attitudes toward decency and the politics of decency. He takes a strong and unequivocal position that it is inappropriate and dangerous for the government to try to regulate morality. He accuses religous conservaties of starting "decency wars" for motives no more noble than profict and political gain.

So this book was so up my alley, it was hard to resist. The content ranged from historical to current, I learned so much about the history of these "decency wars" that I did not know, and I was refreshed on the incidents I was well aware of. For instance, I had no clue that the Puritan religious culture of our country can actually be traced back to Henry VIII! And in regards to the religous conservatives, who were a just target in this book, I'm generally pretty open and understanding in regards to people's convictions, but I tend to not tolerate people who force their ideals onto me...for this my respect is low for anybody who tries. I don't sympathize with the relgious conservatives, I don't get political on my blog much anymore, but I think these people are destroying our culture, and thank goodness this book exists to prove it!

When I first started reading this book, my husband noted that the thing he doesn't like about non-fiction books is that they often expose a problem, but not the solution. I read non-fiction a lot, this doesn't bother me, but he is a little bit correct. This is exactly why I was happy that this book devoted the last chapter to a solution for fighting this particular problem. The bullets weren't a stretch to the things I already believe or already do, but what they did do was make me realize that there's more I need to do (without feeling like I wasn't already doing enough).

I grabbed another book catalog from the mail the other day and noticed that attacking the religous right seems to be the new favorite thing with a few of these upcoming books. All I have to say is good, because I'm sick and tired of the way they've constantly attacked other groups on their radio and tv shows, even to the point of threatening the lives of other people who even oppose them just a little bit...if this isn't decent then I don't know what is?! I may read a few of these new books, but I don't know. I like to balance out the amount of political books I read, sometimes all of the yelling and screaming from both sides tends to wear me out and I need to take a break for awhile.

Technorati : book, censorship, decency, first amendment, frederick lane, frederick s lane, the decency wars

Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity

I finally finished this book today. I guess according to my All Consuming account, I started it six weeks ago...that sounds about right. It seems like I have about a million books going on right now and this one got buried on my desk until today. I know this isn't a new book but we got a brand new copy at the library and I decided to finally read it. It was a bit of a life changing book for me, not complete life changing, but I have seen enough progress with the advice in this book to know that it absolutely works.

When I first got the book I devoted an entire weekend to going through my crap to start the organization process. Well, six weeks later most of what I started then is still in place! I started an inbox not just for stuff at home, but I've applied the same principles to work and school things. My email situation has improved tremendously. I went from having over 400 messages in my inbox, about half of them unread to currently 23 and only 3 unread. I've also managed to get the amount of junk mail and paper crap hanging around my apartment in various places to reside mostly in one organized mail section of the apartment. This has helped keep the sanity in our home...we can actually eat at our dining table now!!!

I do recommend this book to anybody who needs a little help and motivation in organizing your life, not just paper clutter (if you're like me), but all the little projects you need to get done. It changes the way you think about what you have to do and you end up being surprised at how much time you really do have to get things done (it's probably more than you think!)

Of course I love GTD tools and hacks, here's a few things that have helped me:

GMail of course, but there's a couple of things you can add to GMail to make life and email easier:

GMail + Firefox + Greasemonkey Extension + GMail Saved Searches Script

This awesome Greasemonkey script adds "virtual folders" to the sidebar of your GMail. This script has helped me organize my email so much that if I'm checking my email on a computer where I don't have it installed, my mail will start to pile up because I only read what's important. When I finally do sit down to take care of the email, it only takes me a matter of minutes to get back down to zero unread again.

I also have a very specific way of attending to my GMail through labels, I do take the time to set up filters to auto label most everything that comes in my inbox. I've found that initially taking the time to do this has saved me a lot of hassle down the road...I do have a lot of labels on my GMail though...for me it's worth it.

There is also a GTD script for GMail, I have it installed but I know I haven't used it to its full advantage. I already had a decent system going with the Saved Searches script to it might be a little too much for me, but maybe helpful for other people.

My other new favorite tool is Hiveminder. For a to do list, this one rocks! I've used a lot of pretty decent ones too, but what I love about Hiveminder is the ability to review and hide tasks (it is built on GTD principles). I usually find that when I start having a mental block of what I should be doing next, going through a using Hiveminder in addition to applying some of the strategies in GTD actually puts me back on track again.

I use Google Calendar now, but another great calendar is 30Boxes. It was hard switching from 30Boxes, but Google Calendar is cool and it integrates right with GMail.

Online tools are nice, but the best thing I did for myself was really just create a space more condusive to getting things done. My clutter is actually minized to a few small piles of manageble things. I utlize the file cabinet I have sitting next to my desk (after I cleaned it out and created file folders for projects), and I put everything where it needs to go now...that is once I actually made sure everything I wanted to keep had a home! I even created a To Go System where all of my work and school projects would also stay organized. Six weeks is a long time for me to keep up any system, so it has worked!

Technorati : 30boxes, all consuming, david allen, firefox, getting things done, gmail saved searches, google calendar, greasemonkey, gtd, hiveminder, virtual folders

Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything

I've been catching up on all the books that I should've read a long time ago, but hadn't had time. Freakonomics was one of those books...plus I was getting to a point where all of the recent books I've been reading are referencing these other ones I haven't...I figured I should read them. I absolutely love this book! Levitt actually made economics interesting, although I'm weird enough to think that it's probably already interesting (especially since I think math and numbers are interesting). Levitt shows us that there's probably a good reason for everything, and one that we probably didn't expect.

I think there will be a revised edition of this book coming out later this year, I'm curious if there will be more scenarios added, or if it's just elaborating on the scenarios already there.

Secret Society Girl: An Ivy League Novel

I vowed to start reading a little more fiction these days. I don't know why I don't, they go by so fast for me, this book only took a couple of days for me to get through. I really enjoyed Secret Society Girl, but I have to admit it was mostly because the experiences of Amy Haskel is similar to the history of my own fraternity. Well, minus it being an ivy league situation and it being an actually "well-known" organization that is critical to your future career possibilities. I could totally relate though. Amy is the first of 5 girls initiated in the most influential secrety society on her presitgious campus, although a few of the alumni have taken issue with decision and decide to put up a good fight.

My own organization had a similar experience, but we were expelled by our national organization (way before I ever joined), as well as other chapters that also initiated women at the same time. From my understanding, our local chapter is the only one of those initially expelled to even exist today, quite an accomplishment, I think. Anyway, the book was a nice easy read.

Technorati : book, college, fiction, ivy league, school, secret society, women