A Short History of Nearly Everything

Title: A Short History of Nearly Everything
Author: Bill Bryson
Genre: Non-fiction (science/history)
Pages: 544
Rating (out of 5 stars): **** 1/2
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Bill Bryson sets out to write a science book that is actually readable.  In it, he briefly covers everything from  the Big Bang to evolution to the discovery to gravity (and much, much more).  The focus of the book is not on the what so much as the how.  How did they figure out the distance to the sun?  How do we know what we do about dinosaurs?  And so forth.
Thoughts: I ate this book up.  It's been a long time since I had read much about pure science, and this book filled that gap for more.  Bryson's writing style is extremely readable, with just the right level of detail that it's quite easy to follow along.  He is also very adept and moving from topic to topic in a very natural way.  Interestingly enough, my biggest takeaway from this book is how little we really know about our universe.  For example, only a tiny fraction of all animals that die end up creating fossils, and then we only find a tiny fraction of the fossils that are on the earth.  There are huge pieces that we are just missing.  Given how little we know, the other surprising thing for me was just how difficult it typically is for new discoveries to become widely accepted.  Bryson details multiple times how the established scientific community discredited new evidence for years and years because it didn't match with their conception of the world, only to be proven wrong later.  Anyway, I would highly recommend this book.  It only missed out the extra half star because I felt like it dragged on a bit towards the end.  It needed to be 50 pages shorter, and it would have been perfect.
Disclaimer: None.

The House of the Seven Gables

Title: The House of the Seven Gables
Author: Nathaniel Hawthorne
Genre: Classic
Pages: 416
Rating (out of 5 stars): **
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: A twisting tale of the Pynchon family, a venerable bunch from a small New England town in the 19th century, who own the House of the Seven Gables.  The story focuses on two members of that family who have been shut up in the house for many years due to some dark past and terrible rumors, and how they finally break loose of those chains with the help of young Pheobe, who comes to live with them.
Thoughts: I never liked The Scarlet Letter or The Cruicible when I studied them in 11th grade English.  Turns out I'm still not a fan of those kinds of harsh, New England, gothic stories.  I found my mind wandering nearly every time I listened to this book, and when I'd snap to I'd usually find that I hadn't missed anything and that the story was still describing some ancient relative of the Pyncheons that had little to do with the plot.  Overall, I just never got into the book, and the best thing about it were the names of the main characters: Hepzibah, Jaffrey, Phoebe, and Clifford.  After living near Concord for the past five years, I'm glad to have read the book, but it's never a good thing when you're relieved that it's over.
Disclaimer: None.

The Lost Symbol

Title: The Lost Symbol
Author: Dan Brown
Genre: Thriller
Pages: 624
Rating (out of 5 stars): ***1.2
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Robert Langdon is at is again, this time right in Washington, D.C.  The plot swirls around the Masons, the U.S. Capitol Building, and the Smithsonian Institution as Robert Langdon is forced to crack an ancient code in order to save his friend.
Thoughts: The Robert Langdon novels are maybe a bit formulaic, but they're certainly page-turners.  Dan Brown really does an amazing job of weaving arcane details and real-life objects into some pretty fantastic stories.  I listened to this one on a drive from Zion's National Park all the way to Tucson, and it was a great way to pass the time.  My only complaint with it is that the build-up and suspense in every single chapter got a bit tiresome by the end of the book.  It just felt like Brown was trying so hard to prolong the revelation of what was really going on that it forced him into some pretty poor writing at time.  Other than that, it's a fun book.
Disclaimer: As with other Dan Brown novels, there's some violence as well as some sexual material in this one.

Mayflower

Title: Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War
Author: Nathaniel Philbrick
Genre: History
Pages: 480
Rating (out of 5 stars): ***
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Mayflower covers the history of the original Pilgrims from the time they leave England to the end of King Philip's War in 1678.  The book really isn't about the Mayflower voyage very much, but instead focuses on the relationship between the Pilgrims and the Native Americans during the first 50 years after the colonists arrived in the New World.  The two groups were able to maintain peace for a remarkably long time, but war was nearly inevitable by the end.
Thoughts: This is a period of history that rarely gets covered, and it's always seemed strange to me that we learn in school that the Pilgrim's landed in Plymouth in 1620 and then the Revolution happened in 1776.  There's 150 years there that we just never learn much about!  So, I enjoyed reading this book to help fill in the gap.  I thought it was well-written, but not grippingly so, and hence I'm only giving it 3 stars.  Still, it's fascinating material and I'm glad I read it and know at least a little bit more about this time period.
Disclaimer:  None.

How Will You Measure Your Life?

Title: How Will Your Measure Your Life?
Author: Clayton Christensen, James Allworth and Karen Dillon
Genre: Self-help
Pages: 240
Rating (out of 5 stars): ****1/2
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Clayton Christensen uses his renowned ideas on business and applies them to people's lives instead.  In particular, he focuses on how we can make sure that we reach our goals, how we can make sure our goals are the right ones, and how to be ethical along the way.
Thoughts: I saw Clayton Christensen give a lecture on this material at HBS a little over a year ago, and it was spectacular.  Reading the book was a great reminder.  In a lot of ways you almost feel like you're reading a church book, except it's not directly preachy and throws in a lot of business references.  But seriously, this is the kind of book I think I should read about every 5 years, just to make sure I'm on track and going where I want to be going.  The only reason it missed out on all 5 stars was that I had heard nearly all of the ideas in the book previously, so it wasn't as new or exciting for me.  Still, I highly recommend it!
Disclaimer: None.

Choose Yourself!

Title: Choose Yourself!  Be Happy, Make Millions, Live the Dream
Author: James Altucher
Genre: Self-help
Pages: 274
Rating (out of 5 stars): ***
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Altucher is a self-made millionaire several times over.  Between each of those times, he lost all of his money, and had to pick himself back up again and start over with nothing.  Along the way, he learned a lot about himself and what makes him tick.  In this book, he shares what he has learned from the violent roller-coaster his life has been.
Thoughts: By nature, Altucher is much more of a risk-taker than I am, and hence he has had both more successes and failures than I have had (or ever hope to have, really).  But, it makes him a very interesting person to listen to, even if I disagree with much of what he says.  The main things I like in this book were his ideas on not getting stuck in a mental rut.  I definitely need more creativity and spontaneity in my life, so I've tried his suggestion of coming up with 10 new ideas every day, and I think it's really good for me.  Much of his advice seemed quite conventional to me (get enough sleep, don't carry grudges) even if they were good reminders.  And then there was plenty of things that I disagreed with completely (you don't need to have a purpose in life).  Luckily, all of it was interesting.  My main complaint with the book is that felt very disjointed, with random stories thrown into the middle of chapters than didn't have much connection to the main point.  Often I found myself thinking, "Okay, this is interesting and enjoyable to read, but what's the point he's trying to make?"  At any rate, this book was not life-changing for me, but it was fun to read and had a few good ideas.
Disclaimer: None.

Addendum:  You can read Altucher's blog at www.jamesaltucher.com.

Adapt

Title: Adapt: Why Success Always Starts with Failure
Author: Tim Harford
Genre: Non-fiction
Pages: 352
Rating (out of 5 stars): ****
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Harford makes the claim that most of the problems we face in today's world are too complex so be solved with a single silver bullet.  Instead, he argues that solutions need to evolve, much like complex organisms have evolved and adapted to very difficult environments.  He they lays out how to create environments that encourage adaptation, failure, and evolution towards better solutions to our most challenging problems.
Thoughts: I really enjoyed this book a lot.  I pretty much buy into Harford's main idea that most problems in our lives, from nationwide issues like healthcare or social security to personal issues like choosing a career or parenting, are so complex that finding the best solution right off the bat is just not likely to happen.  I really liked how this book made me think about what I'm doing in my life to stay adaptable and tolerate failure when something that I try doesn't work.  I think that the ideas in this book are applicable to nearly anything, and are worth thinking over.
Disclaimer: None.

Mornings on Horseback

Title: Mornings on Horseback: The Story of an Extraordinary Family, a Vanished Way of Life and the Unique Child who Became Theodore Roosevelt
Author: David McCullough
Genre: Biography
Pages: 370
Rating (out of 5 stars): ***1/2
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: A biographical sketch of not just Theodore Roosevelt, but of his whole family.  The book describes what it was like growing up a Roosevelt, and follows Teddy only until about age 30, a full twelve years before he became president.  Rather than give a full biography, the goal of the book is to help the reader understand how Teddy became Teddy, one of our most iconic presidents.
Thoughts: This is another great McCullough book, full of interesting detail and extremely well-written, as I've come to expect from McCullough.  I did find it fascinating to learn about Theodore Roosevelt's upbringing in one of the super-rich families in New York.  My only complaint really is that it ends too early; I wish it had at least covered his life up until he became president.  Instead, we miss out on any information about his rise in politics or his time with the Rough Riders and the Battle of San Juan Hill.  On the other hand, the focus of the book allows much more detail about Teddy's upbringing in a truly unique family.  So, there's trade-offs there, I guess.  Overall, another solid book from David McCullough.
Disclaimer: None.

Eldorado

Title: Eldorado
Author: Baroness Orczy
Genre: Classic (19th century adventure/romance)
Pages: 352
Rating (out of 5 stars): ***1/2
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: A sequal to The Scarlet Pimpernel, Eldorado picks up the plot and follows Sir Percy and his gang back to France who seek to rescue the young King Louis XVII from the hands of the French Revolution.  But the plot thickens when one of the Scarlet Pimpernel's gang ignores his command and endangers the Pimpernel himself.
Thoughts: This is the kind of fun, light-hearted book that I have a hard time putting down once I start.  I'm a sucker for intrigue and twisting plots, and this has plenty of those.  My only complaint is that it might be a bit over-dramatic at points, but you have to expect that with these kind of books.  Overall, a very worthy sequel to The Scarlet Pimpernel, and if you liked the first one you should pick this up as well.
Disclaimer: None.

Matterhorn

Title: Matterhorn
Author: Karl Marlantes
Genre: Modern Fiction (Vietnam War)
Pages: 640
Rating (out of 5 stars): ***
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Lieutenant Mellas arrives in Vietnam and joins Bravo Company deep in the bush.  The book follows Mellas and Bravo Company over the next three months as they struggle to capture Matterhorn (a low-lying hill), while coming to grips with the meaning of the war and life and race and growing up.
Thoughts: This was an incredibly captivating, well-written book that really opened my eyes to what the Vietnam war was like for at least some of the Marines.  It's really hard to comprehend what it must have been like for these 18-, 19-, and 20-year-olds to suddenly be making decisions on which the lives of many men depended, and to be faced with dealing with the mental burden of living with those decisions for the rest of their lives (if they lived).  This book does a great job of trying to convey that, though.  However, I can't whole-heartedly recommend this book due to lots and lots and lots of bad language (F-bombs), heavy violence (as you might expect), and many inappropriate sexual references as well.  In the end, I kind of feel like reading this book is like watching Saving Private Ryan (which I haven't seen): in order for it to be realistic, there is a lot of filth and violence.  So, that's why it gets three stars from me.  I'm glad that I've read the book, but I'm not going to recommend it to my boys when they're older.
Disclaimer: Lots of language, violence, and inappropriate references.  HEAVY disclaimer on this one.

Inverting the Pyramid

Title: Inverting the Pyramid: The History of Football Tactics
Author: Jonathan Wilson
Genre: Sports (Non-fiction)
Pages: 384
Rating (out of 5 stars): ***1/2
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Wilson covers the history of soccer (football!) tactics from its beginnings up to the present day.  From the very first matches on up nearly until WWII, most soccer teams employed only 2 defenders and had 5 forwards.  Since that time, the pyramid has inverted, so that today we see 4 defenders and only 1 or 2 forwards.  Wilson talks about the matches, coaches, and players who were involved in that evolution, describing how ideas bounced around the globe until we came to the point we are at today.
Thoughts: You have to really love soccer to like this book, but if you like soccer you should totally read it.  It's changed the way that I watch games, actually, as I have a much better idea of the role each player is supposed to play and how they came to play those roles.  Also, I thought it was really interesting how he described the way that different ideas were exported around the world.  This idea of exporting and importing ideas I think is really at the basis of how businesses (including soccer teams) around the world stay competitive.  So I loved that aspect as well.
Disclaimer: None.
Note: A huge thanks to Kati and Joe for getting me this book for Christmas 15 months ago!  The fact that it took me 15 months to read it is simply due to the fact that I mostly listen to books, and didn't have a chance to read a real, physical copy until I rode on so many airplanes and sat in a lot of airports over the past few weeks.  Anyway, many thanks!

Rocket Boys

Title: Rocket Boys
Author: Homer Hickam, Jr.
Genre: Memoir
Pages: 368
Rating (out of 5 stars): *****
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Homer Hickam,  a 14-year-old boy in Coalwood, West Virginia, decides in 1957 that he's going to learn to build rockets so that he can someday get out of his small coal-mining town and join the team in Cape Canaveral.  He and his group of friends start learning how to build rockets from scratch and come of age in the process.
Thoughts: This is the best book I've read in the past few months, easily.  Maybe I'm just a sucker for coming-of-age stories, but I really enjoyed this book a lot.  I love that it's a true story, and it had just enough humor, tension, interesting facts, and difficulties to keep me hooked all the way through.  This is the kind of book that I really want my boys to read when they are teenagers; it's all about pushing through difficulties and finding a way to make things work when things don't go your way.  All in all, just a great book.  Also, the movie October Sky was based on the book, so if you've seen that and liked it, you'll love the book.
Disclaimer: Some teenage romance, but nothing too descriptive.

Thinking, Fast and Slow

Title: Thinking, Fast and Slow
Author: Daniel Kahneman
Genre: Popular Science (non-fiction)
Pages: 512
Rating (out of 5 stars): ****
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Daniel Kahneman, a Nobel-Prize winning psychologist, boils down decades of psychological research into how humans think and make decisions into a single volume.  In it, he describes the differences between fast and slow thinking, the biases that result from fast thinking, and ways that our surroundings and experiences can alter our decision-making in surprising ways.
Thoughts: This was a spectacular book if you like psychology and/or economics.  It basically covers all of behavioral economics in a very readable format, with clear examples but enough technical detail as well.  I liked it enough that I bought a print copy of it for reference.  However, keep in mind that it does kind of read like a reference book a little bit; it got to be a bit tiresome to read straight through, I thought.  Still, an amazing book from one of the best thinkers in the past 50 years.
Disclaimer: None.

This I Believe

Title: This I Believe: The Personal Philosophies of Remarkable Men and Women
Editors: Jay Allison & Dan Gediman
Genre: Philosophy
Pages: 320
Rating (out of 5 stars): ****
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Over the past several years, NPR has aired a feature called This I Believe in which individuals from all walks of life write and record personal belief statements.  Each statement is around 3 1/2 minutes long (about 400 words), and is typically focused on one personal belief or one story that has changed their views on life.  This book is a collection of those recordings, with about half of them coming from more famous people and the other half being culled from individuals who have submitted their "This I Believe" states to NPR directly.
Thoughts: I really liked this book a lot.  It was fascinating to listen to what people would choose to say given only 400 words to write a personal belief statement.  I found myself constantly thinking in my head, "What would I write?"  In fact, I've committed myself to writing one (I've started, but it's really hard!), and it's been a really healthy thing for me to try to do.  Nearly every segment made me think hard about whether I believe the same thing, or why my beliefs differ from others'.  If you're going to read this book, I have two recommendations.  First, listen to it on audiobook.  They have the authors each read their own statements, and I really liked having each person's own voice behind the statements.  Second, don't listen to it all straight through.  I found that with one belief statement coming right after the next, I didn't have enough time to think about what the last person had said, and sometimes I'd find myself thinking about the last statement while the next one was going on.  It'd be better to listen to one or two, then take a break, I think.
Disclaimer: None.

Caleb's Crossing

Title: Caleb's Crossing
Author: Geraldine Brooks
Genre: Historical Fiction
Pages: 336
Rating (out of 5 stars): ***
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Bethia Mayfield is a Puritan girl living on Martha's Vineyard in the early 1600's when she meets a young Native American man named Caleb.  Bethia and Caleb secretly meet many times, learning each other's language and customs and gaining an appreciation for the differences between them.  Eventually, Caleb decides to cross over completely into the English world, but the transition is much more difficult than either could have imagined.
Thoughts: There was a lot to like about this book, but for some reason it took me a while to get into it.  If I could, I'd give a separate rating of 2 stars to the first half of the book, and 4 stars to the second half, because I really liked the second half a lot.  It was particularly fascinating for me because a lot of the book is centered on Harvard when it was just starting out, and I really liked reading about how the college worked almost 400 years ago.  Also, it was very interesting to read a bit more about the prejudices that divided the Pilgrims from the Native Americans so strongly, and made it so difficult for them to reach any kind of understanding.  All in all, if you like historical fiction, you would like this book.
Disclaimer: None.

The Mayor of Casterbridge

Title: The Mayor of Casterbridge
Author: Thomas Hardy
Genre: Classic
Pages: 400
Rating (out of 5 stars): ****
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: As a young man, Michael Henchard sells his wife and daughter in a fit of drunken rage.  As the years pass, Michael establishes himself and becomes successful, but his dark past hangs over him, and eventually comes back to haunt him.
Thoughts: Somehow, I forgot to review this book when I finished it, so my memory is a bit hazy now on the details.  But, I remember really liking this book.  It's got plenty of plots twists that keep it interesting, but Hardy is really at his best when he examines characters that are in difficult moral circumstances.  This book is full of those, and pondering over the characters makes you see a bit of yourself in each of them.  All in all, a really great book.  I think I might have actually liked it more than Tess of the D'urbervilles.
Disclaimer: None.

Northanger Abbey

Title: Northanger Abbey
Author: Jane Austen
Genre: Classic
Pages: 192
Rating (out of 5 stars): ***
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Catherine (the heroine) heads from her rural country home to Bath, where she enjoys society and makes friends with a man whom she's quite interested in.  Will she end up with him?  Or will the formalities of 18th century society get in the way?
Thoughts: This is classic Jane Austen writing: lighthearted, easy to read, engaging, romantic, and critical of society in general.  I really enjoyed the story and the writing for the most part, but in my opinion this doesn't compare to Austen's more famous works like Pride and Prejudice or Emma.  Still, if you're in the mood for some Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey was a good, if not great, book.
Disclaimer: None

Endurance

Title: Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage
Author: Alfred Lansing
Genre: Historical Non-fiction
Pages: 288
Rating (out of 5 stars): ****1/2
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: In the summer of 1914, Ernest Shackleton set off with 21 other men on a quest with the goal of making the first transcontinental journey across the Antarctic Continent.  It did not take long for disaster to strike, however, when their ship was frozen solid in the middle of an ice sheet before even touching land in Antarctica.  Endurance chronicles the crew's astounding journey that had an entirely new goal: survival.
Thoughts: Between this book, Unbroken, and Undaunted Courage, I've had the pleasure of reading about some truly amazing accounts of the indomitable human spirit over the past few months.  Really, each of those three books is worthy of my highest praise.  And, to be honest, I think that Endurance just might contain the most incredible story of the three.  The extremes that these men suffered while stuck on sea ice in the middle of the ocean is just unfathomable.  Hunger, cold, thirst, fatigue, despair . . . and yet somehow they kept their wits about them.  It's just incredible to even think about, to be honest.  I highly recommend this book to anyone who's looking for a great adventure story.  And it's a true tale to boot!
Disclaimer: None.

The Good School

Title: The Good School: How Smart Parents Get Their Kids the Education They Deserve
Author: Peg Tyre
Genre: Non-fiction/Self-help
Pages: 256
Rating (out of 5 stars): ****
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Peg Tyre, an education journalist, brings together as much research as she can gather in this book on how to identify a good school and a good teacher for your child.  She tackles all the major questions: picking a pre-school, the importance of class size, reading, math, teacher quality, and how to make a difference at your school.
Thoughts: I think that everyone who has a school-age kid should read this book.  It does a really nice job of synthesizing a whole bunch of information, and directly and answering the questions that concerned parents would like to have answered about their child's education.  Each chapter had some clear, major take-aways, and I felt like it at least gave me a clear set of things that I want to make sure that my kids' schools have.  I also really liked that the book was very fair, and that it was not pushing a particular agenda.  Tyre was open about what we still don't know, and openly says that some of her recommendations will likely change as new evidence comes out.  I really appreciated that.  I only have two complaints about the book: (1) it used a fair amount of research, but rarely were the claims backed up by numbers.  For example, she said pre-school teachers who are very verbal (talk a lot) do a better job of helping kids learn language skills.  That's good to know, but how big was the impact?  How much do they need to talk?  I just felt like it was light on real numbers so that I could get a handle on the magnitude of the various effects.  (2) It was bit on the dry side.  Writing a book like this that isn't dry is pretty hard to do, so this is a pretty minor complaint.  Anyway, besides those two things, this was really a great book.  Highly recommended.
Disclaimer: None.

Robinson Crusoe

Title: Robinson Crusoe
Author: Daniel Defoe
Genre: Classic
Pages: 304
Rating (out of 5 stars): ***
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: The classic tale of poor Robinson Crusoe, who was stranded on a tropical island for 28 years.  Through his ingenuity, he not only survives, but comes to live in relative peace and comfort on the island, before he finally finds a way back to civilization.
Thoughts: Robinson Crusoe has been on my to-read list for a long time, and I'm glad that I finally got around to it, but it's not one that I'll highly recommend to someone looking for an exciting adventure book.  Crusoe is regarded as one of the earliest English novels, and so I think that reading it is more of an educational experience than pleasurable.  Defoe is prone to spend too long describing some things and not long enough on other parts, I felt like, so I wasn't never really captivated by the book.  I often found my mind wandering while I listend to it.  But, for being written in 1719, it's pretty darn good, and it's certainly become an important part of our culture.  I think you just have to expect some long, winding plots and some philosophizing with these old novels.  Overall, I'm glad I read it, but it was a bit of a project to get through.
Disclaimer:  None, other than the fact that Defoe is quite racist, as all white Europeans were in 1719.

To The Rescue

Title: To The Rescue: The Biography of Thomas S. Monson
Author: Heidi Swinton
Genre: Biography
Pages: 600
Rating (out of 5 stars): ****
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: The biography of President Monson.  Not much more to say than that.
Thoughts: I had heard from several people that this was a great book, and I definitely agree with them.  I feel like President Monson has a very different personality from President Hinckley, and so when that transition happened it was hard for me to imagine President Monson as the prophet.  This book really put into perspective the greatness of this man for me.  I just can't get over how many stories are in there of him listening carefully to the Spirit and then reaching out to the one.  President Monson is an incredible example of that.  And, I don't think I had fully comprehended just how long he's been in full-time service for the Church.  He was made an Apostle by David O. McKay, for heaven's sake!  I think that you have to admire his incredible endurance to serve so faithfully for so long.  Anyway, I really enjoyed this book a lot--it's chock full of great stories, it's entertaining, and it's inspiring all at once.
Disclaimer: None, obviously.

The Upside of Irrationality

Title: The Upside of Irrationality: The Unexpected Benefits of Defying Logic at Work and at Home
Author: Dan Ariely
Genre: Popular Science
Pages: 352
Rating (out of 5 stars): ***1/2
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Dan Ariely is back with a sequel to Predictably Irrational.  In this book, he covers new experiments that he has run, and explains how our irrational behavior doesn't always result in bad consequences.  He covers a wide range of topics, with the book being separated into a section on irrationality at work and another section on irrationality at home.
Thoughts: I really enjoyed Ariely's first book, Predictably Irrational.  The sequel is just as clever, but for me it held fewer "aha" moments, in which I'm really wowed by learning something I didn't know before.  Maybe that's because I'm already pretty familiar with behavioral economics, so I'm a tough customer in that regard.  My only other complaint is that I didn't feel like the book lived up to its title.  I didn't find much good about irrationality at all in the book, and still don't see how it is anything but just a continuation of his first book.  Still, Ariely is a great writer, and I really enjoyed the book quite a bit.  My favorite part was the section on the "Ikea effect"--the fact that we value something more when we put it together, even if putting it together doesn't require much effort on our part (e.g. by adding the eggs and oil to a cake mix, we like the cake more than if we didn't have to add them).  Overall, a solid book if you like this kind of thing.
Disclaimer:  I don't remember anything too sketchy in this one.

The Scarlet Pimpernel

Title: The Scarlet Pimpernel
Author: Baroness Emmuska Orczy
Genre: Classic
Pages: 320
Rating (out of 5 stars): ****1/2
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: During the French Revolution of the late 18th century, Madame Guillotine is busy beheading as many aristocrats as she can capture.  But the mysterious Scarlet Pimpernel, and his gang of British noblemen, are smuggling out dozens of French royalty right under the noses of the Inspector of the Republic, Chauvelin.  Who is the mysterious Scarlet Pimpernel?  Will "those Frenchies" catch him in his most perilous adventure yet? Thoughts: My mom loved the movie version of this book, so I've probably seen that at least three or four times.  I've also seen the musical, which my awesome cousin Laura starred in in Logan.  But somehow, I had never actually read The Scarlet Pimpernel.  In fact, it wasn't until Jenn's dad told me that he had read it that I even knew there was a book.  I'm so glad he told me, because this was a delightful book!  It's in the same vein as The Three Musketeers, but much more concise and with more of a love story woven through it.  I really thought that the writing was superb, and the story is great, of course.  I really like it a lot, and would highly recommend it.  I just might try a few other Scarlet Pimpernel novels in the future.
Disclaimer:  Quite clean, except for a few English gentlemanly swear words.

I Am America (And So Can You!)

Title: I Am America (And So Can You!)
Author: Stephen Colbert
Genre: Humor/Satire
Pages (words): 240 (N/A)
Readability: N/A
Rating (out of 5 stars): **
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Stephen Colbert offers "knee-jerk beliefs" about everything that is destroying America, from pets to old people.
Thoughts: I think The Colbert Report is hilarious (I watch it during my lunch break most days, and it may be my main source of news), so I was excited to read Colbert's book.  I have to admit, I was disappointed in it.  The definitely had its funny parts, but overall wasn't as funny as I had hoped, and had more foul language that I cared for.  I wouldn't really recommend it.  Good thing I only listened to the abridged version, so I didn't waste too much time with it!
Disclaimer: Plenty of bad language in this one.

The Year of Living Biblically

Title: The Year of Living Biblically: One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible
Author: A.J. Jacobs
Genre: Experimental Journalism
Pages (words): 416 (N/A)
Readability: N/A
Rating (out of 5 stars): ****
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: A.J. Jacobs follows up his book about reading the entire Encyclopaedia Britannica (my review of that book is here) with a chronicle of his quest to live the Bible literally for an entire year.  And I mean literally.  He grows a beard, wears only white clothes, stones adulterers, and is absolutely honest to the point of brutality.  He participates in sacrifice, and circumcises his newborn sons.  This book follows his journey, giving details of how the quest affects his life, his way of thinking, and his attitude towards God.
Thoughts: I really enjoyed Jacobs' first book, The Know-It-All, so I thought I'd give this one a try.  It was even better than The Know-It-All.  The Year of Living Biblically was not nearly as blasphemous as it sounds, actually.  I really appreciated that Jacobs approached the task seriously.  At the start of the year, he is basically agnostic and completely secular.  He's never gone to church, doesn't believe in God, and is skeptical of religion.  But, he's afraid that he's missing out on something, and so he decides to live strictly by the Bible for a year.  Not the way I would go about learning about religion, but, hey, if you can get a book deal out of it I guess you do it.  Anyway, the book has it's funny parts of course, like when he has to have a specialist come to make sure that his clothing doesn't have mixed fibers in it, but the parts about him trying not to covet, or learning to pray, are actually really good.  He gains a huge respect for religion, and it was very interesting to watch his outlook on life change and he tried to live the principles of the Bible.  I would highly recommend the book to anyone.  It's entertaining and enlightening at the same time.  And, it made me really, really grateful to have The Book of Mormon and modern-day prophets that can help us know which commandments are still in force and which are obsolete.  I'd hate to have to play a ram's horn at the beginning of each new moon.
Disclaimer:  There's a bit of swearing in the book, but it's pretty clean overall.

The Great Stagnation

Title: The Great Stagnation: How America Ate All the Low-Hanging Fruit of Modern History, Got Sick, and Will (Eventually) Feel Better 
Author: Tyler Cowen
Genre: Economics
Pages (words): 128 (N/A)
Readability: N/A
Rating (out of 5 stars): ***1/2
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Cowen lays out an argument that the United States is in the middle of an economic stagnation, one that began in the early 1970s.  His main argument rests on the idea that for the first 200 years of the history of the U.S., we had a lot of low-hanging fruit that made our economy grow steadily and rapidly.  Then, about forty years ago, that low-hanging fruit ran out.  He then goes over the implications of this for how we should expect the future to pan out.
Thoughts: I enjoyed this more than I expected to.  I read Tyler Cowen's blog, Marginal Revolution, pretty regularly, so I had heard the basics of his arguments before reading the book (an extended essay, really).  But it was really nice to hear the whole thing put together in one solid framework, rather than in bits and pieces like you get it on the blog.  The book is somewhat economics-y, so it might not make a ton of sense if you haven't had at least an Econ 101 class, but I would definitely recommend it if you're interested in macroeconomics, innovation, or business at all.  I'm fairly convinced by most of his arguments.  Also, Cowen's a good writer who doesn't take extreme positions in order to make a point, and I can really appreciate that.
Disclaimer: None.

The Corrections

Title: The Corrections
Author: Jonathan Franzen
Genre: Modern Fiction
Pages (words): 568 (N/A)
Readability: N/A
Rating (out of 5 stars): No Rating
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: A novel about an older Midwestern couple who want to get their family back together one last time for Christmas.  The difficulty is that all three of their kids have serious issues going on in their lives, but all of them are trying to smooth over the problems, rather than confronting them.
Thoughts: You'll notice I didn't give this book a rating.  That's because I only got maybe 50 pages into it when I gave up.  It was just too dirty to complete, which is sad because I've heard so many good things about Jonathan Franzen, and the book seemed pretty well-written.  Unfortunately, it appears that Franzen, like many modern authors, is more concerned with writing about sex than about life.
Disclaimer:  Too explicit to complete.

Fire and Rain

Title: Fire and Rain: The Beatles, Simon and Garfunkel, James Taylor, CSNY, and the Lost Story of 1970
Author: David Browne
Genre: Non-fiction
Pages (words): 392 (N/A)
Readability: N/A
Rating (out of 5 stars): **1/2
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: Browne follows four major 60s rock bands through the year 1970, chronicling the way that the bands came apart in the midst of a changing era.  The Beatles, Simon and Garfunkel, James Taylor, and CSNY all struggled mightily in 1970, and in many ways this year altered the course of rock music drastically.
Thoughts: I thought I would like this book more than I did.  I really like the Beatles, Simon and Garfunkel, and James Taylor (but I'm not a big CSNY fan), so I figured this would be an interesting read and a great way to learn a bit more about this point in American history.  While I did get a bit of that, I often caught myself thinking about something else entirely while I listened to the book--a sure sign that the book isn't holding my interest well.  I think I hoped for a more coherent narrative that told a story.  Instead, the book was more like 4 separate timelines of a single year--one timeline for each band--that just marked off major events in the lives of the bank members.  At the end of the book Browne tried to show that the events reflected a bigger theme, but I just didn't buy it.  Instead, I felt like I just read about one concert or rehearsal after another, with lots of drugs and arguing in between.
Disclaimer: Some swear words, and lots of drug usage.

2010-2011 Books in Review

It's time for another book review!  I've fallen into the habit of doing these every two years or so.  Here are my previous reviews: 2009, 2007.

Over the past two years, I've read 30.5 books (I didn't finish one of them), all of which have been reviewed on this blog.  It surprised me to find that I only gave the full 5 stars to one of those books.  I must be getting crotchety in my old age, I guess.  However, there were several that just missed the 5-star cut, ending up with 4 1/2 stars instead.  So, without further ado, let's get to the top three!

And . . . drum roll please . . . the top three fiction books from 2010-2011 are:
The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet (Modern)
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Classic)
The Glass Castle (Memoir)

I should note that The Glass Castle is technically non-fiction, but the stories in there are so outrageous that it really feels like a novel.

For this Review, I feel like I really need a separate list for the non-fiction books because I read some really great ones over the past two years.  So, keep that drum roll going . . . the top three non-fiction books from 2010-2011 are:
NurtureShock
Predictably Irrational
Undaunted Courage


I highly recommend all six of these books.  They could all be 5-star books, even though I only gave full marks to The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet.  The links will take you to my reviews of them.

Lastly, the worst book I read over the past two years was A Happy Marriage, which gets low marks for highly explicit material.  It was the only book I didn't finish out of the 31 on the list.

For the numbers-oriented, here's a statistical summary of my reading in 2010-2011.  For comparison, the number in parentheses is the corresponding figure for all 86 books that I've read since 2007.

Average Pages:  389.9 (377.3)
Average Reading Grade Level:  8.53 (7.65)
Average Rating: 3.71 stars (3.67)
Average Rating by Genre:
   Classic: 3.83 (4.03)
   Fantasy: 3.67 (3.44)
   Memoir: 4.25 (3.64)
   Modern: 3.38 (3.69)
   Mystery: 3.50 (3.19)
   Non-fiction: 3.85 (3.65)

If you're curious, here's what I've got on my stack to be read next:
Fire and Rain: The Beatles, Simon and Garfunkel, James Taylor, CSNY, and the Lost Story of 1970
The Corrections
The Year of Living Biblically
The Upside of Irrationality
To the Rescue: The Biography of Thomas S. Monson
Inverting the Pyramid


I'm always looking for recommendations, so please leave them in the comments!  Happy reading!

Moonwalking with Einstein

Title: Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything
Author: Joshua Foer
Genre: Popular Science
Pages (words): 320 (N/A)
Readability: N/A
Rating (out of 5 stars): ***1/2
Reviewed by: Ben
Description: On assignment, the journalist Foer is sent to the U.S. National Memory Championships, and is so intrigued by the competition that he spends a full year preparing to compete in the event the following year.  This book chronicles all that he learned about memory and memorizing along the way.
Thoughts: This was a thoroughly enjoyable book.  I've always been fascinated by memory and learning, so this book was right up my alley in that regard.  There were several things that I learned about the mind that were completely new to me, and I really liked the section about how in many ways our memory is what our conscious selves are.  I only have two complaints with the book.  First, I was hoping to come away with more practical advice about how to naturally remember stuff, but unfortunately something like that doesn't exist.  That's not really a fault of the book, it's just the way things are.  Still it served a great reminder of the memory tricks I've learned in the past that I don't use anymore.  My second complaint is that Foer tends to ramble quite a bit.  That's good because the book covers a lot of ground, but it wasn't always in the most coherent way, I felt.  Overall, I'm really glad that I read it, but it wasn't the best book of the year.
Disclaimer:  There are a few swear words, but that's it.