New Reading from 1H of 2016

I posted at the end of last year on the books I had read in hopes anyone who followed me might find something interesting and pick up a good book in the process. The first half of this year has kept me on a plane for a heavy portion of time. Twenty-two cities from January to June. During those miles I've had the opportunity to suck down a ton of new reading. Here is a list and a brief review of what I've consumed. I hope you find something that looks interesting to you:

1. Everything that is Bad is Good for You: A fun read mostly directed on things related to pop culture content. How plots of movies and TV have become more nuanced and sophisticated and have a positive cognitive impact, not a negative one. I particularly liked his analysis and writing about how video games have broad sets of rules - but they don't tell you how to win or succeed (RPGs) and through probing, we learn problem solving. I've used this argument with my wife on why I encourage our son play video games at an early age.

2. Easy Street: The Hard Way: I am pretty sure you weren't expecting my second book of the year to be a Ron Perlman memoir - but little did you know I am a huge Beauty and The Beast TV show fan.... that's a lie. But I did like the book. I found it interesting how ephemeral success seemed to him and I think its a good reminder that luck is a factor in all of our lives. Hard work alone isn't a magic elixir that cures everything. I liked that he lived a lot of his life behind a mask too - between The Beast and Hell Boy his fame has been physically hidden to most people. There is a humility that comes through his writing because of that. 

3. The Invention of Air: A fairly cerebral read but I liked Johnson so I went it for the third book he has written. It's the story of James Priestly who is the most written about man by the founding fathers (in their letters) that wasn't a founding father himself. Beyond that it's a really interesting read on the thought process of these men (the founding fathers and Priestly). One - they appreciated, respected and loved the act and process of scientific discovery. Two - they kept moving - they covered a ton of ground and many projects over their life times. The restlessness and eagerness for change and evolution is an admirable quality - it pulled the best out of them over their lives. 

4. Originals: How non-conformists move the world: The idea of being a non-conformist is probably attractive to many people and why the book did so well. I liked it but it did not blow me away. Very formula driven business writing from what I could tell. I did like a few of the general arguments such as -- 1) we really shouldn't trust our gut unless we have a very deep experience in a space. Our guts are not magic and they are often wrong more than right 2) Power vs Status. Power is pushing to control things but it can't buy respect - status comes only through respect. It can't be willed. 3) Defensive pessimist are just as successful as strategic optimists on the 4 box model in terms of their ability to make money and have success in business. There is no tax for being one or the other in the real world. 

5. The Big Short: I just wanted to read the book after seeing the movie. That's pretty much it. A deeper and richer background of the players you see on the big screen and worth the read if you really enjoyed watching the film. 

6. The New Jim Crow: Probably the most impactful book I have read on race and American history ever. It's a home run and I encourage anyone who even thinks they understand how our racial misalignment in America has persisted into 2016 to pick this up and absorb the fact based writing style. I was really interested in the topic as I started to see the clear race baiting of Donald Trump in this campaign. I wanted to understand why we as a society are still lying to ourselves when we think we have evolved to a state of colorblindness. I wasn't let down - this is an incredible piece of writing. Highly recommended. 

7. The Wizard of Oz: Yes, the actual book. I ended up reading it to my son at bed time. The one chapter on how the Tin Man lost his heart is actually rather tragic to read. A friend lost her father the same week to heart cancer and I found myself crying a little as I read the words of Frank Baum during that chapter. 

8. When Breath Becomes Air:  We all die. We all don't record our death in the clinical yet emotionally powerful way that Paul Kalinithi did in this book. I found the afterword written by his wife even more beautiful. If you have the courage to pick it up and read it -- its worth the tears you will shed. 

9. Confessions of a Pricing Man: Maybe the most skilled pricing expert I have ever read. It is a great way to think about the psychology of price, the practical signals of price and the ways you can architect pricing mechanics to achieve certain outcomes. What it clearly showed me is that premium pricing (not luxury level or mass market) is king. It reminds of a great quote on the art of sales and pricing - "The only difference between a Rolex and a Seiko watch is that the Seiko works a lot better."  

10. To Sell is Human: Generally I liked this and I do think that anyone who is on the front side of a business needs to understand that selling is much more nuanced than what it meant even 20 years ago. One of my favorite take aways from this book was: Caveat Emptor to Caveat Venditor - We've moved from a world of caveat emptor (buyer beware) to one of caveat venditor (seller beware)-- where honesty, fairness, and transparency are the only viable paths to success. Amen brother - amen. 

11. The Essential Drucker: I read it to get a distilled management consultant view of the world. Some classic pearls of wisdom but in the world I live in it seemed a bit dated and stale. I couldn't find a lot of application to current systems and operating problems I encounter with customers today. 

12. How to Castrate a Bull: The story of how NetApp was built and made it. Some good start-up war stories and a lot about personality management as well as how to grow a company quickly. One really interesting point around scaling fast is that companies always scale past where they think they are going and they always climb too high too fast and are forced to acclimatize and then keeping moving forward. There is no perfectly synchronous strategy across driving revenue, product development, service and human capital management that holds up in the real world of scaling a start-up. 

13. Think Twice: Think Twice is a lighter version that has less impact than it's brother (below). Written by the same author skip this one and read The Success Equation. Some of the advice in the book is interesting though-- we have to constantly be prepared to fight our own desire to make fast decisions and reduce problems down to less complex parts in an effort to satiate our desire to come up with a "reasonable outcome". If things aren't analyzed in complex systems small changes on inputs can make big changes on outputs. 

14. The Success Equation: One of the best business books I've read in a long time. The dissection of the luck and skill continuum combined with the reasoning and logic of how the human mind operates (we all overvalue our worth on a relative basis and are too optimistic we can impact outcomes) is a really nice blend. Michael goes to great length to work through real math to explain, demonstrate and validate his points. A highly recommended read. 

15. The Next Decade: One of the most well conceived books I have read on geo-political matters ever (not that I have sucked down a ton). I was really impressed with the notion of republic and empire and how, whether we like it or not, the USA has been thrust into an empire status in a post WWII world. That has distorted our behavior in very specific ways. I also was impressed with Friedman's prescience on world matters and specific nation states decision making process given were about half way through the decade he is describing in the title. Many of his "calls" have already come true. You can see why he consults with and for the CIA. If you're an isolationist this will give you an ulcer so don't read it and keep your head buried in the sand -- but if you have a brain and want to widen the telescope - buy it. 

16. Nudge: I wanted to like this book and just did not. It was a lot of very practical evidence about decision making but it failed to understand that humans make decisions that are counter to their actual self-interests all the time. The policy recommendations start to feel like they are operating in a vacuum once you get into it and it just falls flat. Pass. 

17. Flash Boys: Fascinating and fun read of you like the Michael Lewis books. It's half about optical networking and half about what we as as society accept as moral and ethical in our business practices. 

18. Shoe Dog: Phil Knight built one of the most iconic brands in human history. But what you likely didn't know is that he spent the first 9 years of his business career effectively reselling another brand -- named Tiger. Nike was thrust upon him as he was getting squeezed by manufacturing partners and the classic swoosh we now associate with great athletes was born from a moment of weakness - converted to strength. He spends a heavy bit of the book on the early years before the Nike brand was born and that becomes the most interesting and illuminating part. 

19. Disrupted: Super funny if you spend or have spent any time in start-up land. Lyons captures some of the the hypocrisy and bullshit that sloshes through the VC funded start landscape with surgical precision - but he also comes off as overly naive and out of touch on other parts of it. It was really funny to realize that one of the villains in the book was someone I actually met days before accepting his job to join Hubspot and terrorize Lyons. Needless to say the book doesn't do him any favors. Truth is always stranger than fiction. 

20. The Midnight Assassin: Maybe the winner if you are looking for a fun summer read or if you have spent any time in Austin Texas. TMA is about the true story of a spree of unsolved serial killer murders that swept through Austin in the mid 1880's as the city was trying to establish itself as an up and coming city of the southwest. The killer pre-dates Jack The Ripper and there are some historians that believe the two could have been one in the same. A bit of a stretch - but the story is awesome none the less. The historic moon towers that still stretch across Austin (and popularized in the movie Dazed and Confused) were born from the terror and fear that strangled Austinites during this horrid killing spree. Check it out. 

21. The Accidental Taxonomist: Taxonomy is from the Greek "taxi" meaning order and "nomos" meaning science. It's literally the science of order. I can't really tell you to read this 450 page tome unless you deal with taxonomy design though. If you do - grab it. It's really well done and takes you through everything you needed to know and then some. 

22. White Rage: As Trump continued to spew venom and thinly veiled racist commentary on the campaign trail I went back to the well to dig deeper into why pieces of America were rallying around this type of hate speech. Not as good as The New Jim Crow but it's really well written and it requires you to look at the country in the unflattering and honest view that we are and never will be a society that will be "post-racial" -- or at least, never in our lifetimes. 

23. The Startup Playbook: A nice compilation of 50 start up founders and executives on why and how start-ups work and more importantly why and how they break. I always try to find patterns in life - this helps you spot things that are simply toxic - things that can hurt you and then the things that can kill you as it relates to working inside the embryo that is a start-up. Well worth it - if nothing else as a good therapy sessions to confirm you are not insane.