Winter Reading List

One good thing about our weather - you sure can get a lot of reading done. For Valentines day Ben got me a book holder for the tub, which was ever so thoughtful and potentially useful, but although I shook out everything that was in the box, I never could find that nanny in there to help make it work. Nevertheless, here's what we got done anyhow:


What I Eat: Around the World in 80 Diets: Peter Menzel & Faith D'Aluisio

I fell in love with this book at Barnes and Noble when I had a few minutes to flip through it. I was stoked to stumble upon in at the library so that I could spend more time with it. Brilliant pictures, fascinating topic. It is a glimpse of a typical day's meal for folks around the world and around our own country. The disparity in caloric intake is amazing...and doesn't always seem congruous with the physical outcome. This large book (think coffee table) provides serious food for thought. The website gives you 'a taste'.

Thinking, Fast and Slow: Daniel Kahneman

Surprisingly to me, this book is the one that I took the most notes on and one I really enjoyed. What makes this book better than those on similar topics (logic, behavioral decision making, psychology) is that it is not just some flash in the pan idea that someone turns into a book, that should have just been an article. This book draws on a lifetime of personal study, heuristics, research (much with his colleague Amos Tversky who died in 1996) and experimentation. Instead of drawing primarily from the work of others, this book seems very much a project all his own. I won't re-write all of my notes but some of the topics I found most interesting include: ego-depletion and glucose demand; cognitive strain and it's affect on temptation, superficial judgement and choices; narrative fallacy and how flawed stories of the past shape our view of the world and expectation of the future; halo effect; WYSTATI = what you see is all there is; rewriting our history to make sense of the present; intuition, premonition and the inability to reconstruct former beliefs after you have changed your mind; remembering self vs. experiencing self; and tidbits here and there on marital stability, goals, happiness and well-being. I didn't tire of this book at all and feel like I know more about myself in the process.


Due Considerations: Essays and Criticism. John Updike

I don't recall ever having read an Updike novel. I'm fairly certain that they would not be permitted in high-school English, but I feel that I may have encountered him in college literature classes via a short story or two. But never mind, this 700+ page book (I did not read all of it) gives plenty of exposure. I like reading peoples view on things, and so I liked his memories of his family, his cars, his reflection on the game of poker. I also enjoyed learning more about other writers through his biographical selections. My favorite thing is his writing style. It feels like a brain massage.









Fooled by Randomness; The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets: Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Summary - It's not the survival of the fittest, it's more the lucky fool that is in the right place at the right time. How often do we see this scenario play out. I think frequently it is the case, though not an absolute. In this book Taleb, an expert on risk, analyzes and gives examples of success and loss, specifically on Wall Street. The take away - life, and the stock market, is unpredictable. I couldn't derive any method for insulating yourself from "randomness", and because I didn't get any real world application, I wish that this had been an article instead. Then I would have some time back that I could then invest in trying to get in the right place at the right time. I also checked out his book, The Bed of Procrustes, which is a collection of aphorisms the author has conjured up. A small book, but too heavy and not entertaining enough for me at this point in my life. I found it to be on the self-indulgent side. But I did enjoy getting my Greek mythology lesson for the day and learning a little more about the story of Procrustes.

Note: After finishing Thinking, Fast and Slow, there were enough references to Taleb's book Black Swan that I might give it a chance.

The Emporer of All Maladies: Siddartha Mukherjee

Knowing first-hand the time demands of a physician, I am astounded by the amount of research Dr. Mukherjee had to do to write this book, and the elegance with which he presents it. He is only 8 years older than me and in addition to attending Stanford, Oxford and Harvard, completing a residency and fellowship, and having great hair, he has already won a Pulitzer prize! Definitely not a case of just right place at right time for this guy. (I'd like to chat with his wife and see if he is also an attentive husband and father to boot) (One thing he can't do is keep his blog up to date...so he is human after all!) Mostly I listened to this in the car, some books are easier for me to listen to, some are more enjoyable to read, I found this to be the former. I can't possibly touch on the depth of information on the topic in here - but I found it fascinating some of the ancient and historical records we have of this malady. There is even papyri that indicate that they were performing surgery on breast cancer as old as 1600 B.C. or prior. The accounts of the disease and it's treatment through the ages is nothing short of fascinating. And although science has made great breakthroughs, there is no happy ending to this book yet. Which is devastating, considering how pervasive and close to home it hits these days. When introducing Dr. Mukherjee and his book on his show, Stephen Colbert said, "and in the end, cancer gets hit by a bus". Funny. But don't we all wish.

Arguably. Essays by: Christopher Hitchens

I love this cover. It's just seems to capture Hitchens' persona precisely. A few years ago, I read his article Why Women Aren't Funny (...actually I first read, Why Women Still Aren't Funny and then read it's prequel ), enjoyed it, agreed with much of it but never sought out any more of his writings. When I came across this compilation at the library I picked it up. This book is equal in size to Updike's (and actually reflects on the American author in more than one essay), and makes me feel equally as uninformed. But that's why I read I guess. I didn't read every single essay, but I enjoyed the ones I did and think that his assessment on issues and people is refreshingly fair and fearless.


Flunking Sainthood: Jana Reiss

I had recently heard an interview with this author and thought that her religious experience reflected my own, but I gave no thought to tracking down her book. But at the library a few days later, there it was on a shelf when I walked in the door. So this book is along the lines of 'Year of Living Biblically' by A.J. Jacobs, and the "stunt journalism" phenomenon. The author, whose religious denomination she never discloses, (but I knew from the interview is LDS), spends each month in a year trying to perfect herself through a specific spiritual practice, such as - fasting, prayer, charity, sabbath-day observance, gratitude, vegetarianism... She draws heavily from strong tradition based religions and their texts, saints, etc. She is pretty funny most of the time. One of my favorite lines is: “These days Jesus and I are like old marrieds – sometimes I’m a nag, and sometimes he is emotionally distant. Maybe the extremes I’m contemplating with a year of bizarre faith practices are the spiritual equivalent of greeting Jesus at the door wrapped only in cellophane. I’m trying to pop a little zing in our relationship.” I can relate to that. I enjoyed the book, I didn't feel rushed to get through it though.

The Whole Brain Child: Daniel J. Siegel & Tina Payne Bryson

This book touts 12 revolutionary strategies to nurture your child's developing mind...I can only readily recall one - using movement and physical activity to change their emotional state. So if you see my kid doing jumping jacks or running laps, I may be trying to shake the naughty out of them. I liked that this book gave me insight as to how kids brains actually work - or how the upstairs brain gets hijacked by the downstairs brain..or left by right or vice versa? I guess it doesn't matter which is which - the emotional side always trumps the logical side and this book helps give you tools to re-route it. It gave me more compassion and patience for the war going on in their tiny, cute, little (or in Cruz's case, large) heads. Now someone needs to write an illustrated board book to help them understand my physiological processes...'Why is Mommy Crazy Sometimes?: Female Hormones for Tots'

An Introduction to Kierkegaard: Peter Vardy

I remember a sister-in-law of mine mentioned once that Soren Kierkegaard was her favorite (or one of) philosopher. Having only taken one philosophy class in college - while studying abroad in Australia - my knowledge of philosophers and their works is limited and I thought that I should change that to some extent. I got this along with Kierkegaard for Beginners by Donald Palmer, which is a heavily illustrated, sometimes amusing take on the philosopher, but Vardy's distillation was more informative. Famous thinkers, artists etc. always seem to have such tragic lives, but often in their torment they can provide peace and clarity to others, so of this I am appreciative.

The Mind: Leading Scientists Explore the Brain, Memory, Personality and Happiness - Edited by John Brockman

Enjoyable essays by disparate authors on a range of topics in the realm of psychology and neuroscience. I appreciate that the authors presented their research for the average person. Topics ranged from innate differences between boys and girls (by Simon Baron-Cohen (who, yes, is related to Ali-G (cousins)), environment and personality; emotion and morality; how the brain works etc. One bit of insight that I found to be of particular interest was in an essay by Geoffrey Miller, who said "the more you understand about genetics, the more you can just relax and love your kids for who they are and who they turn out to be, and the interests that they show, and you can abandon this idea that the kids are born as formless blobs and you have to shape all of their desires and their capacities yourself. It removes some of the burden and anxiety from parents." And he goes on furthermore and explains why if you go to private school or Banning High, it may not make such a difference down the road...and that the reason the private schools are scoring higher on exams and such, is because they are taking in brighter kids to begin with. But what the essay is really about is sexual selection. I also liked the one by Jonathan Haidt, despite my disagreeing on many ideas he purports. You can read most of the stuff in this compilation, and then some, on the website Edge.org.


The New Evolution Diet: Arthur DeVany

One of my favorite things to read about is health- exercise science and nutrition. Of the books on this topic I read in the last few months this was my favorite and the exercise advice really resonates with me - random, explosive, all-out kind of workouts that "shock the body" are the best kinds. The great thing about this philosophy is that it takes way less time...and I think it's more fun. But I have always been more of a fast than slow-twitcher anyway so it's what works for me. His eating advice is along the paleo lines, together with intermittent fasting. If I lived by myself I would probably naturally gravitate toward this type of diet, but I have family members who demand bread, sugar, etc. The author himself is interesting and worth checking out - he and his wife are 73 and look amazing....so as they say, the proof is in the (sugar-free) pudding. Surprisingly this book is how I stumbled upon Nassim Taleb and his book above - he wrote an afterword.

Along this vein I also read 4-hr Body - Timothy Ferris (large volume, distilled information - science blended with research and trial, not a huge fan of the author's lifestyle) and Eat to Live -Joel Fuhrman (a veggie only book, which I can't do but can incorporate. The author says that broccoli has more protein than steak calorie for calorie. Which I didn't know, and which sounds like a LOT of broccoli.

Virus of the Mind: Richard Brodie

This is an introduction to memetics, or memes [meem]- term coined by Richard Dawkins in the 70's that is essentially an idea or belief set that we obtain from society, culture, media, upbringing etc. At first I found the book to be compelling, but tired of it quickly. I think the word meme was used too often for me. Many of his examples and arguments are valid and give insight into why we as individuals or groups hold to the beliefs we do. We are being attacked and invaded by memes all the time. One example I thought of while reading this is the 'gluten-free' craze. The campaign for this lifestyle is so rampant and sophisticated that I myself have stood in a grocery aisle contemplating whether or not I should go gluten-free, even though everything I had previously known, or recently researched indicates that it would do nothing for me except drain my pocketbook and disappoint my taste buds. So I liked that reading this book allowed me to recognize memes around me and I feel freer in being able to do so. Bottom line though, there are probably better books on the topic out there.

Catching Fire & Mockingjay: Suzanne Collins

Finished these in rapid succession to the Hunger Games. Loved the second one and the third was fine. I wouldn't have known how to end the series and I think it ended appropriately. I think that the movies will be a raging success.

Reading May 2011 - Jan 2012

Have You Filled a Bucket Today?: A Guide to Daily Happiness for Kids - Carol McCloud: I can't say enough about this book or concept. It's a great way to teach kids about kindness and maximizing their own happiness by spreading it to others using the metaphor of bucket filling and emptying. Also a great reminder to adults.

Hunger Games - Suzanne Collins: I know I am way behind the curve on this one but it is my current obsession. My sister gave this book to me for Christmas and said, "trust me". A few pages in one night, I knew this book would present a problem to my shut-eye. So I held off till the morning. Never have I been so excited to get up and get Avery off to the bus. I then brought the boys into bed with me so that my body heat would keep them asleep and I proceeded to read till it was over. I took one break to make them brunch when they woke up at noon, then they were promptly plopped in front of a television until I finished at 2pm. It took me a few days to shake the feeling that I was part of this story. I still wish I could have thought this up. If there is anyone left who hasn't read this, you have until March before the movie comes out. One of the jacket reviews touts that this book is "perfectly paced". That's probably the best way to describe it. It's easy to read, intense, wildly entertaining, tragic, gripping with bonus points for keeping it clean. Target audience - teenagers - or middle aged white women who drive station wagons and get the occasional speeding ticket.

Unbroken - Laura Hillenbrand: Oh man, this story was gripping as well. But true. I listened to this one on cd when we were travelling around California, and while my usual go-to for long drives is talking to Ben on the phone (hands-free of course), what I really wanted to do was find out what was next for Louis Zamparini and his World War II compadres. This one will also be made into a movie, no trailer yet. Sharks, sociopaths, Billy Graham...this story has it all. Ben also listened to this one and it almost made his commute enjoyable.

What Would Google Do? - Jeff Jarvis: Someone at work recommended this to me. It was boring. Maybe if I was currently in a management position it may have some value, but I didn't find that it inspired anything beyond what one might come up with intuitively.
I wish I could make the picture of the book smaller.

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother - Amy Chua: Wow Amy Chua, you are crazy, woman! But I love it. If she was submitted as a tribute for the Hunger Games she would survive, I'm sure of it. This Yale law professor/author/tiger mother has seriously high standards for her children. Sure, we all think we are whipping our little ones into shape, but compared to her techniques I might as well be letting my kids stay up late watching Netflix on the iPad, sleep in till noon, eat peanut butter out of jars and marshmallows out of bags and sign their one page of homework off without even glancing at it to see if they did it right...er...but it's cool as long as they practice 5 minutes of piano and I fawn all over their slaughtering of a simplified Imperial Death March, right? Amy Chua has her kids redo their homemade birthday cards to her if she feels that they did less than their best. But guess what, she has a daughter at Harvard. You can read an excerpt here. Interesting note: For bookshelves in China the title was changed to : Being a Mom in America. :)

Designing with Succulents -Debra Lee Baldwin: Pretty, pretty succulents.

Sugarsnaps and Strawberries - Andrea Bellamy: Great for any level of gardener with any size of garden.








Spousomics: Using Economics to Master Love, Marriage and Dirty Dishes or How to Maximize Returns on the Biggest Investment of Your Life. - Paula Szuchman & Jenny Anderson: Hmmm. I'm on the fence on this one. I like marriage and I like Econ, so I enjoyed the premise. The chapters are organized into common economics topics- Loss Aversion, Division of Labor, Game Theory and I think it is a fun and novel way to look at relationships...I just feel like it fell into the traps that lots of books and even more movies do too often - by inserting excessive foul language and a general sexing up when unnecessary. Some things are worth taking to heart and applying but overall I'm not sure how qualified the authors are to offer some of the advice and think that some of it may have harmful implications.

At Home: A Short History of Private Life & I'm a Stranger Here Myself - Bill Bryson: At Home was my introduction to Bill Bryson. I picked this book up at the library off the shelf. It's long but chock-full of fascinating history of the components and activities of various rooms of a home including but not limited to: the kitchen, the fuse box, the garden, bedrooms, bathrooms, attic, nursery and drawing room.

The Victorian time period being ever so formal but rife with scandal makes it perhaps the most interesting of times to read about, although we can be made to appreciate modernity on multiple occasions. And if we thought our current supply of produce was toxic one of my favorite passages in the book talks about how cherries could be made to glisten afresh by being gently rolled around in the vendors mouth before being put on display. How many unsuspecting ladies of quality, he wondered, had enjoyed a plate of luscious cherries that had been 'rolled and moistened between the filthy and, perhaps, ulcerated chops of a St Giles's huckster'? It's a long book but the good news is that you can jump around to that which interests you and not get lost.

Since I really enjoyed Bryson's wit and style I picked up a couple of his other books and read the fairly short I'm a Stranger Here Myself about his experience coming back to the U.S. after living in England for 20 years. Not as jam packed with info as At Home, but okay. Basic premise - we drive everywhere.

Be a Successful Property Manager - R. Dodge Woodson: Made me realize that I do not want to be a property manager.

What's Gotten into us? Staying Healthy in a Toxic World - McKay Jenkins: Alarmist without being alarmist, Jenkins basically breaks down our basic environment - home, food, body, lawns and the amount of chemicals we are surrounded by everyday. I enjoyed it, but I am into worrying about stuff like BPA, PCB's, phlalates, dioxins etc. I probably don't recommend this book for most, because if you do read it you will have no choice but to escape into the wilderness naked and take your chances with the wild animals. So I won't say anything else, but the inside of microwave popcorn bags are covered in Teflon, which I'm not sure mixes well with heat. And most chemicals have some sort of immunity from testing for health implications. Cheers!

The Great Divorce - C.S. Lewis: I'm a C.S. Lewis fan. I just am.

I am in awe of his skill with allegory and frequently enlightened by his symbolism. In this book I was astounded by his grasp of both humanity and divinity and darn it if I didn't get a glimpse of myself here and there among the inhabitants of his hell (which thankfully is more like purgatory). As with most Lewis, one page might be the most you can handle at a time. So many quotes of course, but my favorite comes from the preface, which alone is worth the read: Even on the biological level life is not like a pool but like a tree. It does not move towards unity but away from it and the creatures grow further apart as they increase in perfection. Good, as it ripens, becomes continually more different not only from evil but from other good.

First Things First - Kurt & Brenda Warner: I picked this book up when the kids and I were at Barnes & Noble and when it was clear that they wanted to stay a while. Warner had recently been in the news advising Tim Tebow to tone down the religious rhetoric (speaking from experience), so I was interested in knowing more about his story. I was surprised at how good it was. Basically it's about their family and the values and goals they have. Both Kurt and Brenda take turns writing about their history and how they make their family work. Surprisingly candid and relatable with some good advice.

Heaven is For Real - Todd Burpo: It's been a while since I read this book, and I sense that the skeptic in me has had time to set in. But if I recall my perception when I read it, I think that the story is incredible and that the details are moving if not amazing. Everyday I make a choice to believe in God, heaven and all that abounds therein, so why couldn't it be for real? And I don't know the title but I recently saw another account that seemed similar to this little boy but the encounter was under different circumstances.

I would be interested to know what anyone else who has read this thinks. It's a very quick and interesting read. Can easily be read in one sitting.

Radical: Taking back your faith from the American Dream - David Platt: Of all the books recorded in my book journal, this one has multiple pages of notes. The author is a pastor of a mega church in Alabama - which caused me to instantly and unfairly judge him as a televangelist who makes major bucks off of his followers by giving them a very entertaining weekly show. Which he very well may make a lot of money and be charismatic, but it's what he does with his church, his money and his life, and then challenges those reading the book to do, that is remarkable. He starts off by changing the premise of his church, saying that a mega-church with all of it's comforts is not what God asks of his disciples, and furthermore that Christ was the pastor of the first "mini-church" and that like Him, we should have material concern for the poor and spend time in another context, away from our big homes and comfortable churches. Platt recounts some great examples of people in his congregation that do so and impact lives in a major way locally and to all corners of the world (specifically China, India, Darfur and Indonesia). The problem with this book is that it is challenging and makes you uncomfortable with your comforts.

Edible Landscaping - Rosalind Creasy: Great resource for integrating a garden into your landscape. Encyclopedia of plants included. Great photos.

Bossypants - Tina Fey: Mostly funny, sometimes tedious, or maybe the reverse. Bad language which never earns points with me. I had two favorite parts. One was her "prayer for her daughter" (If you click on the link, be prepared for some of that language I mentioned). The other favorite excerpt is: About the current beauty ideal. Now every girl is expected to have Caucasian blue eyes, full Spanish lips, a classic button nose, hairless Asian skin with a California tan, a Jamaican dance hall (bum)…the hips of a nine-year-old boy, the arms of Michelle Obama, and doll (boobs). The person closest to achieving this is Kim Kardashian , who was made by Russian scientists to sabotage our athletes.

That, I thought, is funny.

Stories I Only Tell my Friends - Rob Lowe: Rob Lowe is a good writer who has lived a fascinating life. I didn't know anything about him and I picked this book up b/c our library was having a/c issues and they only had a few kiosks of books available for checkout. So I got this, Bossypants and Stolen Life. All of them have the "F" word, but I think I have belabored my disapproval of this already. His stories about growing up in Hollywood were really interesting and I enjoyed his writing.

A Stolen Life - Jaycee Dugard: A major downer, of course. I didn't know that she was tazed to facilitate her kidnapping and that scares me as a mother.

Instant Physicist: An Illustrated Guide - Richard Muller: Everything you ever wanted to know about lasers, bio-fuels and radioactivity but were too dumb to understand! This book is really fun I thought and was full of interesting info like on pg 104 - If the sun blew up we wouldn't know it until 8.6 minutes after because that's how long it takes for it's light to reach the earth. And pg. 110 - Organic foods are higher in poisons and carcinogens that foods grown using pesticides. Typically the natural pesticides in organic foods are thousands of times more carcinogenic than artificial pesticides approved by the USDA - and they can't be rinsed off. I don't know what to believe anymore.

I Don't Believe in Atheists - Chris Hedges: Even though I get that it's a joke, I don't love the title of the book because it is offensive, but I did love it's cute little size and gold cover and I thought the content was good. The author observes two radical and polarizing sides debating faith and religion in the U.S. - fundamentalists and atheists. I have a few notes but it's been so long since I read this that they are cryptic to me. I think this quote came from the book, "Science without religion is lame and religion without science is blind." And also something to the effect that it's not what we do in life, but what we do with what life gave us, enduring with compassion, wisdom, humility and accepting the ambiguity and ultimate mystery of existance. I may have to go back and read this again b/c I think I liked it but can't remember specifics.

Lights Out / Sex, Lies and Menopause - T.S. Wiley: I can't remember what turned me on to this author but I checked both of her books out at the library and I thought they were great. Basic premise - Get adequate, if not abundant sleep (in complete darkness) and if you are going to eat sugar and stay up late do it in the summer when the days are longer. She also has a lot to say about bio-identical hormones. I thought that these books would be smart reading for any woman, regardless of age.

Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic and Madness at the Fair that changed America - Erik Larson: This historical fiction novel about the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago is riveting. Larson intertwines the lives two men: one a doctor and murderer, the other an architect in charge of designing and carrying out a huge undertaking in the World's Fair. It took me a few tries to get into this but I'm glad I stuck it out. I was even reading this when we went to Chicago last spring so it was fun to explore some of the architecture in the book. This took a long time to read but I am excited to read Larson's next book about Nazi Germany.





It's You and Me Lord: My Experience as a Black Mormon- Alan Cherry: This book did not end up in my hands organically as many of my eventual reads do. In fact, I'm not even sure that this book is still in print. I ordered this book used as a part of interest and study in the experience of Black Americans in the Mormon church that came about mostly through discourse and disagreement with Ben. Good read, interesting experience and testimony, especially considering the time period he joined the predominately white church. What I have found of greater and continued interest is the Sistas in Zion website and the Genesis Group.

NurtureShock: New Thinking about Children, Po Bronson & Ashley Merryman

I was made aware of this book by a friend whose book club was reading it. Aside from the single long black hair I discovered part way through (which reminded me how very public library books are), I loved this book. I recommend it (and have many times already) to any parent, grandparent, teacher or anyone who will ever have a role in a child's life. I read many tidbits out loud to Ben (as I do frequently with many things that make it onto my reading list), and really wanted to share information from every chapter with him, or I wanted him to read it himself. He said that I should take notes for him. Unfortunately, this entire book is already so condensed that every paragraph is of worth. Each chapter tackles a different topic, such as "the inverse power of praise", sleep habits and how it affects kids, why kids lie and "why white parents don't talk about race".

The race chapter and the included study results were particularly interesting to me and inspired a rather shocking interaction with my own child. It is important to read the book to get the details but the gist of it is that in our efforts to be "colorblind" and not discuss and or acknowledge racial diversity we are instead leaving children to draw their own conclusions about race relations. After reading this particular chapter, while putting the children to bed (earlier than usual, based on the readings in a previous chapter) I decided to ask if the kids "liked people with brown or black skin"? Ever diplomatic (and fresh off of Black History Month at school), Avery responded in the affirmative and gave specific examples of one of her friends whose skin was "beautiful". Miles shook his head no and continued to work on the puzzle in his lap. I thought for sure that he must have misunderstood and asked the same question again, to which he continued to say no and continued to work on his puzzle. I then brought up names of his friends from church with brown and/or black skin who he did agree that he liked. But no one else. I didn't have to say anything because Avery unleashed on him, I'm fairly sure she was quoting Martin Luther King in her rant. He still wouldn't budge. When I asked him why, he said..."they might snatch me". Cue explosion in my head.

On one hand, I am glad my child has some fear that a snatching could indeed occur. On the other, very large hand, I am appalled that he would attribute this possibility to a certain group of people, and I've done a search of the child predators in our area, and they are dominantly old white men (and we live in a diverse area). But back to the study, this is what the book found; That unless you tell your children explicitly, that you yourself do like people of other races, then they won't get it. No matter how much Little Bill you have them watch or even if they see you with friends of varying color. So right then and there I bore my testimony that their dad and I do indeed like people with brown skin and black skin. The next day I repeated the initial question to Miles and he decided that he does in fact like people with brown skin and black skin. I don't know why that was so scary to talk about, but I'm glad I did. (There are a lot of other studies in this chapter, involving intricacies of how children shape ideas of race, the introduction of Black Santa, etc.. Interesting stuff)

Read it.

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The Moral Landscape: How Science Determines Human Values, Sam Harris

I picked this book because the title sounded interesting. I started it on CD because that's what the library had available, but three discs in I went in search for the hardback because I needed to see if it was his delivery that I was struggling with or if it indeed was failing to deliver substance. One thing I hate is wasting time, my own time, others time, watching others wasting their own time (subjective I know), but especially my own time. Which is what Sam Harris did to me by making this into a book and not an article. Because, besides one novel thought that he had in the first 100 pages (that I wrote down in own of my many notepads but can't find) I found it to be a super tedious endeavor. The title promised a book about how science can help us be better people, and what it delivered was extreme examples of injustice and conjecture. I was hoping for more of a day-to-day application of his scientific discoveries. He's probably a great thinker and neuroscientist, he just happens to be a very poor storyteller. (I am apparently in the minority on this, as I just checked Amazon's reviews of the book and it has a bunch of positive reviews, including the first one which calls it "A provocative feast"!) . I almost gave up on it but I skimmed through and thought it got better around page 138. I also thought his Acknowledgements section showed some personality. And I liked that there were nearly 100 pages of Notes, which made the book much shorter than I had originally thought.

Reading. And Read (past-tense).

Welcome to the August -November meeting of the LW Book Club...

My Lobotomy. By Howard Dully.

Wow. And Yikes. Interesting story. The story more interesting than the writing. Although it's a fairly quick read, I think it was a little too long for what it was. So if you're interested you can click on the book image at left to go to the NPR segment on it that started the whole thing.

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Gifted Hands. By Ben Carson, MD.

True story of his life. I'm pretty sure there is a made for TV movie of this book which I haven't seen but his story is great. It chronicles his rough childhood being raised by a single mother (who is undoubtadly to be credited for much of his success) through to numerous surgeries he has performed as a neurosurgeon. It sounds cheesy, but if you don't believe in miracles, you may after reading this book.

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Seattle Kitchen. By Tom Douglas.

Yes, I read cookbooks. Especially if they give you hints about places to eat where you live. This is a good one - the recipes and the suggestions. I can't remember what I made out of here but it was good. Oh yes I do, Corn Bread Pudding.

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Ad Hoc at Home. Thomas Keller.

I love everything about this cookbook. It's size, the photographs, the recipes, the prose. Delicious.

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Stumbling on Happiness. By Daniel Gilbert.

Saw this book on the Tovar's blog was intrigued by this blurb, so I checked it out at the library. It's about the psychology of happiness, written by a dazzlingly witty author. And I would really love to finish this book because it's such a pleasure to read but someone who I guess wants to be in my bookclub stole it from me and I haven't seen it since. By the way Ben, it's overdue.

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No Man Knows My History. By Fawn Brodie.

This is a loooonnng book, full of detail. So I am not done with it yet, and not sure if it will go the way of another very looonnng book about Joseph Smith - Rough Stone Rolling - and never be finished by me. Not for any reason except that I have limited reading time and a reading wish list that is quite extensive. Plus, although I am finding it interesting, I am growing weary of Ms. Brodie's attitude that is omnipresent. As if she wrote the entire thing with a smirk on her face. Let's just say, she don't like Joseph Smith. And she made sure to gather much of her research from like-minded folks. It's like using Kanye West as a resource for a biography of George W. Bush.

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The Year of Living Biblically. By A.J. Jacobs.

The premise of this book intrigues me. I am not very far into it - probably because it's the kind of book I want to read excerpts of out-loud to someone, but my someone is rarely home. So it's slow going so far for me. Hopefully no one is waiting for me to return it to the library because I keep renewing it I think this would make a great movie/documentary. And apparently Brad Pitt does too because it looks like his production company is working on it. Which is great. I just hope to finish it before it hits theaters. Here is a fun list of some of the "rules" he had to follow to fulfill his quest.

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Get Me Out. By Randi Hutter Epstein, MD.

Another winner for me. Just look at the cover. I love it. This is a history of childbirth from the beginning of time to today. It is so interesting. I need more people in my bookclub because I want to have play by plays of this one with someone too. Two thumbs up for fun, factual, sometimes disturbing info about making and having babies.

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The Freud Reader, By Peter Gay.

I'm just including this because it's in a pile of books I am looking at. I just got it to cross reference some facts in another book I was reading. This collection probably has some interesting theories in it. And may give me insight into why my carrots grew the way they did.

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In-N-Out Burger. By Stacy Perman.

The subtitle is "A behind the counter look at the fast food chain that breaks all the rules". I read two pages and realized that I didn't want to read about In-N-Out. I just wanted a hamburger.