As chance would have it, I happen to have a few recommendations for this 100th anniversary of Armistice Day, or what we now call Veterans Day. 1. All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque. Written from the perspective of a German soldier in the last year of the war, it has been […]
Read Factfulness: Ten Reasons We’re Wrong About the World — And Things Are Better Than You Think
August 19, 2018 by
Things were not better when we were kids. Not by a long shot. As one of my heroes once said: “There never was a greater time in the history of the world to live upon the earth than this. How grateful every one of us ought to feel for being alive in this wonderful time with all […]
Dunkirk? Speaking of WW II history, here are a few recommendations…
August 9, 2017 by
(Recommendations at the bottom. If you have a favorite you don’t see listed, post it in the comments.) Known as “Operation Dynamo,” the evacuation at Dunkirk began on May 26, 1940, saving 338,000 Allied troops from the German juggernaut. On June 4, Prime Minister Winston Churchill took to the floor of the House of Commons […]
Book Thoughts | Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
February 27, 2017 by
I’m not entirely sure that I can adequately review Thinking Fast and Slow. It’s so chock full of fantastic ideas, insights, and information that I’m afraid even trying to comment on it will make me look like a fool. Let me just say, then, that Thinking Fast and Slow is absolutely fascinating, a book worth […]
Book Review | One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
February 27, 2017 by
I suppose it’s a bit ironic that I finished One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich in the midst of one of last weeks winter storm, snow falling and wind blowing and the temperature dropping as low as 2 degrees Fahrenheit. And yet, Utah’s snow is just as quick to melt as it is […]
Book Review | From Silk to Silicon: The Story of Globalization Through Ten Extraordinary Lives by Jeffrey E. Garten
April 5, 2016 by
In From Silk to Silicon: The Story of Globalization Through Ten Extraordinary Lives, Jeffery Garten offers a brief history of globalization over the course of humanity’s history. It’s an enjoyable jaunt through the last thousand years, and while Garten’s approach is less that of a historian and more of a layman’s, his broad strokes make […]
Book Review | The Billion Dollar Spy: A True Story of Cold War Espionage and Betrayal by David E. Hoffman
January 20, 2016 by
Adolf Tolkachev’s story is one of brilliant courage and heroism. That it ends in tragedy and betrayal only seems to accentuate the stakes that he faced in his struggle to tear down the totalitarian tyranny of the Soviet state. David Hoffman’s telling of Tolkachev’s story in The Billion Dollar Spy: A True Story of Cold […]
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