Bill Clinton: The Survivor
The Survivor, by John Harris, has been one of the best of the presidential biographies I've read. I read recently that it was considered one of the most accurate books about what it felt like and what happened inside the Clinton White House by by some of his insiders. The book re-shaped many of my views of Clinton, with some wild swings in both directions. The Survivor is not like Woodward's "tick-tock" accounts (a phrase I learned in the book to describe the precisely chronological storytelling. Rather, it tackles topics by chapter, with the timeline roughly in place but with Read more…
Can we finally get rid of phone books please?
I don't know what the last time was I used a phone book. But every year I get at least three delivered to the door. It's driving me crazy to see that waste of paper. I know some people use them, and that's cool. But why can't I opt out of getting phone books? I don't want them, I didn't ask for them, and yet they keep coming and ending up instantly in the recycle bin. Does anyone know if it possible to halt delivery?
Geeking out
Mary just got back from a week-long visit to St. Louis. While she was away, I let my inner geek run loose. There was the Saturday tech conference, of course. I finished the first season of Chuck, a show about a computer geek who accidentally ends up with government secrets downloaded into his brain. And my dad and I watched all three Lord of the Rings movies in 3 days. Inspired by that, I also sketched out an idea for a fantasy trilogy of my own if I ever decided to write one. Chuck is a fun show–a guilty pleasure Read more…
#MyFirstAmazonOrder was April 3, 1999. It was for 6 books. Here are the covers.
I liked all of them besides The Moviegoer. And I got absolutely hooked on Sherlock. See the full gallery on Posterous
Mark Cuban suggests a proposition I’d actually consider paying for …
So to summarize. In addition to Fox websites from around the world, a $ 79 dollar annual value, you get: 2 books from our Harper Collins collection, with a value of up to $79; a subscription to the Weekly Standard, worth up to $64; a special $99 credit at The Fox Store where you can pick from an amazing selection of movies and TV shows. For a total value of $321. Because our Fox News Junkie Subscribers are critically important to us, we are offering this special package for a limited time only. This amazing package can be yours for Read more…
I still love the book itself
I very much enjoy reading a book on the Kindle. But I do love a really good hardcover even better. A well designed dust jacket … uncut pages … seeing the visual progress with my bookmark … and a thick spine that promises countless hours of reading. It has its downsides, and that’s when the Kindle can be nice See the full gallery on Posterous
“Free” by Chris Anderson
I read Free for free on my Kindle. Anderson's put his argument (that giving something away for free can make you money) to the test, by offering free versions of his book for a limited time in a variety of digital forms. He also personally bought the rights to the audiobook, booked the studio time himself, and has made the audiobook free with no time limit. It's a proposition that seems to have worked, since the book debuted on the New York Times bestseller list and is still there (down into the 30s now). His book is well worth the Read more…
Travel as a Political Act
I've read a smattering of articles and essays that deal with the philosophy of travel, so I was intrigued when Mary picked up Travel as a Political Act by Rick Steves. I picked it up as soon as she finished it. Steves lays out a pretty basic premise: travel to see how other people live, and evaluating your own society because of what you learn, is a fundamentally political act. The book is at its most interesting when Steves shares his own experiences of traveling in El Salvador, Iran, the Balkans, Turkey, and Morocco. Oddly, it's less interesting when Steves Read more…
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