I know it has been a while since my last book review, but it is basically because I haven’t listened to any audio books recently, and also b/c I’ve been slowly reading a biography on Charles A. Lindbergh. To be honest, I didn’t know too much about Lindbergh except that he was the first to fly across the Atlantic non-stop, and that he was a proponent of isolationism before World War II. As you might imagine, there is a lot more to this very complicated person. He apparantely was one of the sternest men around, and he liked to do things his way, unless of course you were an expert on the matter, at which he would anxiously listen and try to learn. A lot of this probably has to do with the fact that he became so popular so fast, that it caused him to try and withdraw from the world just to get some sense of privacy. The amount of dinners and banquets that he was subjected to after his flight were on the order that no man had ever been through before.

Anyways, he eventually met his wife Anne, and they had I believe 7 children, one of which was kidnapped and subsequentely killed, although accidentally. The kidnapping sparked one of the most fierce man-hunts in the history of the states, and eventually ended with the execution of a man who claimed to be innocent, despite having tons of evidence against him, including some of the ransom money paid out to try and retrieve the baby back.

Lindbergh and Anne spent many months travelling the world and exploring everything there was, despite the fact their children were left at home. Of course, this was more of Charles’ doing as he wanted to explore, and what Charles wanted, he basically got. Charles spent much of his time after the flight and after marriage as a liason working with the airline companies tracking new routes, including being part of the first air mail route planning committee. Basically, everything revolved around aviation in the beginning.

Eventually, Charles became fixated on biology, specifically on how to create an apparatus that could keep organs alive. He and another scientist invented the first heart pump, a revolutionary invention as most trials to do such a thing at the time failed b/c infection would get into the heart and blood as the pump became contaminated. Not too bad for some guy who was only known for planes.

Prior to WWII, and despite visiting Germany, Charles was a strong proponent of America staying out of the war. He actually visited Germany prior to the start of the war, and was able to provide insightful feedback to the allies about their capabilities. A lot of times you hear just that…”Lindbergh the isolationist,” but he actually became for the war as soon as America was attacked at Pearl Harbor. He recognized what had happened and what needed to be done, but his isolationist views are what most of know and hear about.

The book is very detailed about all aspects of Charles’ life, and is part of the reason it took me a while to read. At times you feel like this should be an autobiography with as much detail is provided, but the author got most of it from Charles’ record and his wife Anne, who sanctioned the author to write the book. Anne was a strong woman who had her own career as a best selling writer, and her only stipulation to the author was she be included in the book. Overall the book is well written, and if you want the inside scoop on one of America’s most famous people, then set some time aside and start reading.

This was another audiobook that I hadn’t heard anything about, but it had gotten some good reviews and was one of the ones audible.com was promoting, so I decided to give it a shot. The book is about a son whose father has recently died, and he begins to find information about how his father was court marshalled during WWII. In researching more, he learns how his father, a JAG officer in the army, tries find another officer (Robert Martin) which is a part of the OSS, a secret department of the military which runs special operations. The book goes back and forth b/t the son and the father, but spends about 85% of time retelling the story of his father…David Dubin. I must say the reader for this book was excellent, and I’m sure that helped, but the story itself was excellent in my opinion. I’m not going to say it was a cliff hanger or anything, but it just seemed to flow smoothly and catch my attention, helping me to recall the time and places we spent in France and Germany.
The book seems to be more guy oriented as I look back on it now, although there is a love interest in the story. Her name is Gita Lodz, and judging by the way she is described she seems like quite a woman…ambitious, sexy, driven…geez, that sounds vaguely familiar to a woman I know.

Anyways, I’ve never done this before, but I thought I would copy down Amazon.com’s editorial reviews of the book, and let you compare what they say to what I have said. Of course, I wrote my review before reading their excerpt, so as not to be influenced.

This book took me approximately 6 months to finish. The reason…when the people were packing our stuff in Germany, they decided that it should be packed as well. So, after reading the first half of the book, I had to go on a 3 month hiatus until I finally unpacked the box it was stored in.
Anyways, the book is good and gives a very detailed account about Einstein. I wasn’t aware that he had actually came up with his famous E=mc² equation. Of course, it took forever and a day for the world to finally come to the realization what it actually meant and the applicability of it, but to do it at such a young age is just amazing.
One thing that author makes sure to point out continuously through quotes of people that actually knew Einstein was that he was a very good humored person and full of wit. People would come to see him and were down right afraid b/c they didn’t think they had anything intelligent enough to say to him, but after just a few minutes he would make them feel at home with a joke or question of some sort that got the conversations going. The book is well written, but if you are not into biography style books, then leave it alone. This is not a novel style book, but does go into some interesting things like his childhood, his political views, his views toward WWII and the atomic bomb, and just a bunch of things you would expect to read about in a biography.

Now this was an audiobook that I hadn’t heard anything about, and decided to just go for it. I read the reviews on both audible.com and amazon.com which were both positive, plus the fact that I like “true” stories, so I decided to give it a try. The book is about the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary and how a crazy man named W.C. Minor, who just happened to be a Doctor, along with an American Civil War veteran, so greatly helped to contribute to it. Minor was an expatriate living in England, and one night woke up believing that someone had just been in his room. He rushed outside and ended up shooting a perfectly innocent man thinking him the person in his room. Obviously, there was no person that had entered his room, so he was charged with murder, and ended up pleading insanity and spending the rest of his days in an insane asylum. During his stay there, he came across a paper asking for volunteers to read through books and contribute words to what would become known as the Oxford English Dictionary (OED). Since he was an avvid reader, and had hoards of time, he began to systematically collect words, write down where they were found, and the sentence they were used in. This was the requirement for submitting words, and is what makes the OED such a success, as you can determine a words meaning, along with when it was first used, and also see an example of its use.

Dr. Minor would end up contributing literally thousands of words, but no one knew he was a certified lunatic. The people of the OED knew that he was a doctor based on his letters to them, but simply did not know he had been committed. Obviously the editor of the OED eventually found out as Dr. Minor never visited when invitations were sent, but most people of the OED at that time never found out.

Overall I enjoyed the book, as I have most non-fiction stories. The only problem I had with it was the audio quality of the recording, but the story was good. So, if you are looking to find out a little history about how the Oxford English Dictionary came to be, and how a one time Civil War medic turned Doctor turned lunatic was able to contribute, then give this book a read (or a listen).

This was a very quick audio book, only about 3 hours in length, and probably a stretch even at that length. I had read the original “Rich Dad, Poor Dad” book about 5 years ago at the recommendation of my uncle, and enjoyed it thoroughly. Therefore, when I saw this book from the same author about the best practices of starting up a business I was quite intrigued. Unfortunately, the book didn’t live up the hype of its predecessor. There were a few good points here and there, but the overall flow of the book didn’t seem to work.

The one thing that I will take away from the book is the advice not to think “cheap”, otherwise your clients will think you are “cheap.” What I mean by this can best be summed up by an example that the book gave. There was a guy who was an accountant and wanted to keep his rates reasonable to attact the most customers, which he ended up succeeding in doing. Unfortunately, since his rates were lower, his clientele seemed to be of a lower class as well, and before he knew it, he was spending more time haggling over his rates and hours with clients than he was able to actually spend working. After finally having enough of this, he decided to raise his rates from something like $50/hr to $500/hr. I’m sure this sent shockwaves through his current clients, but in the end he started getting new clients who were willing to pay for his services (which were good), and he started to make more money, working less hours, and not having to deal with “cheap” people. Moral of the story, if you think of yourself as “cheap”, so will others.

This was another audiobook that I have recently finished, and I must say I did enjoy it. I have read other reviews on the book that complain about the book not going into details about how it came to its conclusions, but if someone wants a book like that, go buy a text book. This book is about giving an economist view on different things in the world based on answering questions that some of us have thought of before, and other things that we wouldn’t think of in a million years. The answers given are derived from statistical analysis, which the book does not delve into too much, hence the complaining of some reviewers, but just touches on how he came to a conclusion. What are the questions you ask? Well, here are some of them:

• What really caused the crime rates to fall dramatically in the late 90’s when everyone was saying they were going to increase?
• Why do drug dealers still live with their moms if they are making so much money?
• Why does a sumo wrestler who normally wins a match only 48% of the time, all of sudden win about 80% time in certain matches?
• Why do blacks give their kids names that may hurt them economically later in life?
• Are teachers cheating to help their students pass standard exams?

As you can see, some of these questions can be quite controversial, and the answers to some of them even more so. I don’t want to ruin the book for you, but his answer to the first question (What caused crime to drop?) is abortion! Talk about being politically incorrect, but after you here is logic, and the actual number of abortions per year, you may start to think so also. Try and take a guess on how many abortions there are to live births. In other words, how many babies are born for every abortion? Well, when the question was posed to me I was thinking about 100 births for every 1 abortion…WRONG!! According to the book, there is an abortion for every 2.2 births!! That is an astounding 31.25% of every baby/fetus conceived. Whatever your political/moral beliefs are on the subject, I would hope you think that number is way out of control. It almost seems that people are using abortion as a form of birth control. I am almost positive that contraceptive companies would go out of business if people were getting pregnant 30% of the time they used their product. Anyways, I’m going on off on a tangent, but at least the book gives you some stats which make you think, which is what I am looking for in books these days….guess that is what getting old is all about. So, I’d give this book a 3.5-4 star rating out of 5, mainly because the last chapter of the book seems to ramble on and on after making its point. It was almost as if they needed to fill space. Overall, an interesting listen/read.

I have finally finished listening to this book. Yes, this another one of the audio books that I have gone through, only this one was as long as the other two combined…about 18 hours worth (or about 500-600 pages). Anyways, the book is absolutely great for the first 9 hours (i.e. first half of the book), but then I found myself losing interest at the end. I really don’t think this is b/c the book gets any worse, but mainly b/c the subject matter is just not as interesting for me. In the beginning, the main topics all deal with Astronomy, Physics, Chemistry, and other miscellaneous things, which are of course right up my alley. At the end, it mainly is referring to Archaeology, Paleontology and Biology, things I don’t really care for. Therefore, if you are like me, you will only need to listen to the first half of the book, which I must admit was excellent! The narrator, as well as the real author, are Bristish fellows, and it seems to add a little bit to the flavor of the book listening to this British chap give you all sorts of information, all the while mixing in a good bit of humor. I must admit I learned a ton of nifty little facts, as well as learning a good overview of a lot other things, even those things I don’t care too much about. If you ever read the reviews on Amazon.com, you will notice that a few people complain about the vagueness, or sometimes inaccuracies of the book, but you must realize this is not a scientific text book, so if he is in vague in areas, it’s probably b/c he doesn’t understand himself, and is just trying to give you the gist of it. As for accuracies of the book, I’m not going to try and disprove anything, although I am sure in another 100 years or so, people will laugh at what didn’t know, or what we thought we knew.

Overall, if you are into scientific things, I highly recommend reading, or listening, to this book. I actually don’t know if I could have read this book, but listening to it in the car, while walking the dog, or simply on a train somewhere, seemed to make it much easier to comprehend. With all the strange scientific words out there, it was sure nice not to worry about how to pronounce them.

As you may or may not know, my theory for Harry Potter books has always been to read them before the movie comes out. Well, on Nov. 18th of this year, the new movie will be coming out, so it was time to catch up and get through the 4th book. The last 3 Harry Potter books have all been good, but the first one always seemed to stand out a little more than the rest. However, as of today, there is a new leader among the pack, and it is “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire”! This book doesn’t seem to go through the motions that the previous two did of trying to let you know who Harry is, and what his past is all about, but instead builds off the past right away and starts off quite early with a new story and adventure. Probably one of the best things about it is that it brings in a bunch of new characters that your mind is able to completely visualize and imagine. Of course, all your imaginations are for not once the movie comes out, but that is why you read the book first! The book goes from one scene to another, without losing anything and keeps you on the edge. I started off reading about a chapter a night, but in the end, I was reading two to three per night. Of course, the first thing you will notice is that the book is much longer than the previous 3 (700+ pages), but it is well worth it. I don’t want to go into details of the book as to not spoil it for anyone, but lets just say I was never able to figure out the ending, despite putting in my best effort of thinking forward and trying to read between the lines. If you haven’t read this one yet, then you must do so before the movie comes out, if for no other reason than for the pure thrill of trying to imagine for yourself what a guy named “Mad-Eye Moody” with facial scars, a magic eye, and wooden peg leg will look like! All in all, an excellent book!!

This was the second audio book that I have finished. I actually finished it about a month ago, and am just getting to writing about it, but that is the advantage of being the chief editor of your own website…you get to make the Deadlines. Anyways, the narrator (a.k.a. reader) wasn’t nearly as good as the guy from the previous audio book, so it took a while for me to get into the book. Actually, to be honest, I never fully got into at all. I don’t think it was so much the narrator’s fault, as it was that the book just didn’t have “it”. You know, the infamous “it” that every writer, actor, singer, future CEO wannabe, etc. are looking for. I haven’t read a ton of Grisham books, only ‘The Firm’, ‘The Pelican Brief’, and most of ‘A Time to Kill’, but in each the book seems to get progressively worse. I absolutely loved ‘The Firm’, but the rest were so-so, and the ‘The Last Juror’ was just boring to me. I am going to give Grisham the benefit of the doubt for now based on my new theory that it is hard to get really excited or revved up when listening to a book while driving. The only other book I have listened to was a non-fiction book, so perhaps audio fiction books just don’t work for me.
OK…enough about why I didn’t find the book good or great. Let me just tell what it is about. It’s basically about a young, mid 20’s (oh how my perception has changed about the young and the old), guy who moves to a small town and takes over the local newspaper. Like me with this site, he is the boss, and makes all the decisions. After a while, a woman is murdered, and the suspect is a guy by the name of Danny Padgett, who comes from a family that is notorious for dealing and running the shady side of things…ie. drugs, moonshine, etc. Of course, as any other Grisham book does, this ends up in court, and there is a trial, and (stop here if you don’t want to know the ending) Danny is found guilty. However, a few years later, there is some killings going and all the people that are being killed, and they are all from the Jury that put Danny Padgett away. Ok…I won’t say who is doing the killing, but I will say that it wasn’t a very exciting read during this time. The highlight for me of the book was of course how the young guy is able to take a small local newspaper, and transform it a highly successful business for himself, and eventually is able to sell it for over a million dollars after just about 10 years. Sounds like a good idea to me, although I don’t think I could convince Barbie to move to the middle of nowhere in Mississippi so I could start up a small local newspaper. I’ll stick to convincing her to move to Miami!

If you have any entrepreneurial tendencies, then you will love this book! Richard Branson, who you may or may not know, is the founder of Virgin Music and Virgin Atlantic airlines, along with many other small Virgin companies. The book starts off by him telling how he almost died on one of his crazy hot air balloon rides, and thus decided it was time to write an autobiography at the age of 43, instead of waiting until some unforeseen accident may occur that would prevent him from doing so. Therefore, he considers this volume I. The book I read was the original and goes up to 1993, but I think there is a new release that probably goes further..and I’ll be sure to pick it up!

Branson basically takes you through his life, and what he was thinking every step of the way. He almost makes you feel like, geez…anyone can become a billionaire if you are willing to work at it. Of course, he did have a fair amount of luck and timing, but overall, he was a hard worker that worked through the speed bumps, and continued to reinvent the company. He started off when he was around 15 or 16 creating a magazine called “Student”, which was obviously geared to students. After a while, he decided to get into the music mail order business since he noticed everyone around was always wanting some obscure music that the normal stores didn’t offer. Originally he had no intention of opening a store due to costs, but the Postal service went on strike, and he quickly had to find a place to sell music, otherwise the company would go into shambles. He then was able to persuade a shoe store owner to let them have the 2nd floor of his building for free, with the promise that the store would bring many students by his shop. This sounded like something my cousin Jon would end up doing, but no one else in the world could figure out how. Anyways, he that was his first Virgin Music store…and as they say, the rest is history. The book is filled with these kind of stories about saving money and keeping overhead down, but still making everyone happy in the end. It was also amazing to hear how the Banks have so much control over a company as volatile as Virgin, since they have to overdraft so much money. At one point, the company is worth $1 billion dollars, but the banks are still giving them hell because they are over drawn on their $50 million dollar limit. Amazing!! Well, I won’t spoil anymore for you, but the book is absolutely GREAT, and I highly recommend it.