While I don’t read as many business books as I used to, I’m always on the lookout for books that can help me grow my knowledge to run a successful business. As a solo-preneur, it’s critical to always be learning, especially given how fast the business environment is changing these days. So when Priyesh Dhorajiwala reached out to me to review his book, The Power of Marketing Channels: A Comprehensive Guide to Growing Your Results, I accepted the offer.
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Book review: The Scenic Route
My typical reading routine involves reading a short story between titles on my reading list. Sometimes the story will come from a collection, such as Stories of Your Life and Others (Ted Chiang) or Selected Stories of Philip K. Dick. Other times, interesting stand-alone titles appear.
Such was the case with The Scenic Route by Christina Baker Kline. An email from Amazon alerted me that it was available for free as an Amazon Original. Since I had really enjoyed Kline’s Orphan Train, it was an easy decision to make this one of my short story readings.
Continue readingBook review: Cryptonomicon
Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson was on my radar for a long time. I originally added to my 2017 reading list. I carried it through to my 2020 reading list, where it finally percolated to the top. When I opened the book on my Kindle, I was taken aback by the length – over 900 pages! Having already slogged through Peter Hamilton’s Pandora’s Star earlier that year, I couldn’t bring myself to read another tome of this length. So it languished on my reading list until the second half of 2023, when I finally decided to take the plunge. I knew I would have to eventually given how highly recommended it came from some close friends.
Continue readingBooks to read in 2025
If you’re looking for a few recommendations for your 2025 reading list, here are a few of my favorites from the past year for your consideration. There are three categories to choose from – general recommendations that cover my favorite fictional reads, technology and personal development, and my fun reads that can use to fill in any remaining holes in your list.
Continue readingBook review: The Go-Giver Influencer
I’m a fan of the Go-Giver books. Having already read two books in the series that I liked a lot, The Go-Giver and The Go-Giver Leader, it was an easy decision to put The Go-Giver Influencer on my reading list. Authors Bob Burg and John David Mann have a way of weaving important business and personal development concepts into stories that makes those concepts easy to digest and remember. It also makes it easier to see how the concepts can be applied to real-life situations.
Continue readingBook review: Privacy Is Power
Privacy is a topic I take seriously, especially as it relates to the data we generate and share online. I’m sure that I come across as paranoid at times, if not all the time, with my refusal to engage in social media and my concerns over browser usage and the sites I frequent while online. Yes, maybe I can take it to the extreme, but the more I read about how companies, governments, and the powers that be use our data, I worry that I may not be taking it seriously enough.
It’s articles like this one that showed up in my feed from Smashing Magazine, Pushing Back Against Privacy Infringement on the Web, that raises online privacy warning flags for me. Our personal data is being used, sometimes for our benefit, sometimes against us, and always for the benefit and profit of the companies that collect, analyze and trade it.
The article is a short read and provides a good overview on the importance of privacy on the internet. But it was the mentions in the further reading that intrigued me. I wanted to go deeper into why privacy is important, which led me to reading Privacy Is Power: Why And How You Should Take Back Control of Your Data by Carissa Veliz.
Continue readingBook review: Miniatures – The Very Short Fiction of John Scalzi
I like short stories. Done well, it’s a great format that engages you, tantalizes you, and presents a big enough idea and/or leaves enough open ends to keep you thinking about the story well after you finish it.
My typical rhythm is to read a short story (or two) between the typical books I read for entertainment. Since most of my entertainment books are built around science fiction, it’s a bonus when I can find a good collection of sci-fi shorts.
One such collection that appeared in my recommendations was Miniatures: The Very Short Fiction of John Scalzi which is, of course, by John Scalzi. Scalzi is a prolific writer. I normally see a lot of his long-form novels in my recommendation feed, so I figured reading some of his short stories would be a good way to see if I liked his writing enough to read some of his longer format works.
Continue readingBook review: Constance
What do the books Infinite, Interference, Bandwidth, and Constance have in common?
Give up? It’s not obvious.
They’re all books that I discovered through Amazon’s First Reads program. If you’re an Amazon Prime member and like to read, I highly recommend this program. It’s a great way to find new authors and build out your reading list, which is why I like it so much. It also doesn’t hurt that I’ve discovered my share of great books (and authors) through it.
Oh, and the other thing these books have in common is that they’re all science fiction books based on hard science fiction. In the case of Constance by Matthew Fitzsimmons, the plot of the story is built around cloning, specifically mind uploading and replication into another human body.
Continue readingBooks to read in 2024
Looking to fill-in the gaps in your reading list for 2024? Out of the 35-plus books I read in the past year, these are the books that I enjoyed the most.
I’ve broken the recommendations into 3 categories – general recommendations (fiction, mostly from the sci-fi genre), personal development, and business. I’ve also included a list of “bonus reads” at the end. These are the books that I enjoyed a lot but wouldn’t say that you have to add to your 2024 list. These are entertaining reads that you can use to fill in any holes in your list.
Continue readingBook review: Lost in Time
For some reason, I’ve read more than my share of sci-fi books built around the quantum physics multiverse, many worlds theory. OK, I know a couple of the reasons why. Once you’ve read a couple of novels in this genre, the Amazon recommendation engine that I have a love-hate relationship with kicks in to suggest more. On top of that, my favorite sci-fi authors like to use this theory, or variations of it, in their books.
That’s why I wasn’t surprised when A.G. Riddle’s book Lost in Time showed up as one of my Amazon recommendations. A.G. Riddle is also one of my favorite sci-fi authors. I try to have at least one his novels on my reading list every year, and this one was the title I choose for this year.
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