Comments on: Recommend a Book I Should Read

By: Eric Wisdahl

Eric Wisdahl — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 14:11:08 +0000

I don’t know if I could list a single book, but here are a few that I generally recommend to people depending on their tastes. I don’t know if I would match any of them up with you with regards to the other books I’ve seen you talk about… But hey, you asked for book recommendations.

Peace by Gene Wolfe.

The Black Company by Glen Cook.

American Gods by Neil Gaiman.

Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson.

Jitterbug Perfume by Tom Robbins.

The Cider House Rules by John Irving.

By: Andy

Andy — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 14:59:34 +0000

Thanks to all for the great recommendations! I’ll start looking at them and get a list published in the next week or so.

By: Smitha

Smitha — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 20:26:16 +0000

I liked “The Art of Possibility: Transforming Professional and Personal Life” – read it years ago and remember enjoying the read. Helps see things through a different perspective – a rosier one, but better a can-do approach (imho) than something less positive.

By: Drew Jones

Drew Jones — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 19:15:17 +0000

“The Fabric of the Cosmos: Space, Time, and the Texture of Reality” by Brian Greene. Or his prior book “The Elegant Universe: Superstrings, Hidden Dimensions, and the Quest for the Ultimate Theory”. Amazingly complex but beautiful descriptions of string/m-theory.

By: Jon Crawford

Jon Crawford — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 17:41:27 +0000

Oh, and one for management topics – the Game Of Work. (www.gameofwork.com) There are several books relating to this, the concepts just make sense to me. Implementing them is the hard part, getting everyone on board from top to bottom.

By: Lori Edwards

Lori Edwards — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 17:40:13 +0000

“The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America” by Erik Larson was a great read. It’s a non-fiction book that reads like a fictional novel about the events surrounding the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair and a serial killer that was at work during that time.

By: Jon Crawford

Jon Crawford — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 17:39:12 +0000

Lives Of A Cell by Lewis Thomas (http://www.amazon.com/Lives-Cell-Notes-Biology-Watcher/dp/0140047433#noop)

It’s a collection of essays, so you have to work your way through the whole book to really get what he’s doing in smaller thoughts, but well worth the read.

Oversimplification of themes: Humans are like termites, we can individually only push around grains of sand, but collectively we can build constructs that last far beyond our life-span, like the development and evolvement of language.

I think this relates to the internet/data storage/our daily life in the same way, what we do today may not change the world tomorrow, but the manner in which we approach it, the effort that we put forth to do it right way or a new, better way has the potential to echo through the future.

Good stuff.

By: Meredith Ryan-Smith

Meredith Ryan-Smith — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 17:10:03 +0000

These are the most recent books I’ve read that have made lasting impressions on me.

What to Eat by Marion Nestle
and
In Defense of Food by Michael Pollen

Neither are about politics per se and totally facinated me.

By: Florian Reischl

Florian Reischl — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 16:40:32 +0000

A non technical must read:
The Pillars of the Earth
by Ken Follett

By: Scott

Scott — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 16:38:51 +0000

“Titan,” by Ron Chernow, a biography of John D. Rockefeller. My favorite biography and one of my favorite books, regardless of the genre.

“Yeager: an Autobiography.” Good pace, lots of fun. Makes you want to watch “The Right Stuff” when you finish.