The First 90 Days

• Author: Michael Watkins
• Amazon link

I was given this book by my boss at Cisco, Shailesh Shukla, when I took on a new role as head of engineering for MARSBU. If you are curious about the acronym, yes, it is the Business Unit from MARS. I opened the book and randomly landed on page 115 which had a section titled "Educate your Boss"; that definitely made this a must read.

The book is definitely a quick read and I had to pace myself so that I don't read it all in a couple of sittings and quickly forget all that I had read. There are some narratives in each chapter thath outline some simple example scenarios, but the author fails to develop any of them beyond a couple of paragraphs. The main theme of the book is compelling. Whenever a manager takes on a new role, he/she will take several days to reach the break-even point, which is defined as the point where the executive creates more value than he/she consumes. Regardless of which level you are at, your first few days in a new role set the stage for your success and if you can properly plan your transition you can make the right first impressions and greatly improve your chances of success. Around 25% of the managers in a Fortune 500 company take on a new role every year. If this book accelerates the transition of even a small fraction of these, then it has achieved its purpose.

There are a few things in the book, that while obvious, are a useful reminder for all of us. The author carefully underscores the importance of first understanding the situation that you are in, i.e. are you in a startup situation, or is it a mature organization in need of a turnaround, re-alignment or sustaining operation. Your strategies are different depending on the situation. There are several other nuggets that the book imparts and I will not give it all away here. The book does tend to get repetitive and does not have too much meat behind the nuggets of wisdom. Nevertheless, it is a useful reminder to all of us when we take up a new role. I recommend this book to anyone who is recently promoted or changing jobs and is most relevant before or as soon as you take on your new role.

The Girl Who Played With Fire

• Author: Lars Neillson
• Amazon Link

This is the second in the Millenium Trilogy by the late Swedish author Lars Neillson. I was simply blown away by the first one (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) and have to admit was a little disappointed with this one. Don't get me wrong; in terms of turns and twists and rapid fire action, this one has it all. However, what I liked in the first novel was the way Lars developed the characters. There was Mikael Blomkvist, the journalist who was uncompromising in his search for the truth; Lisbeth Salander who was fascinating as a brilliant hacker and researcher, but a misfit in society; the Vanger family who were rich, aristocratic and interesting, each in their own way. For this one, the main characters, Blomkvist and Salander have already been developed, so there is only repetition of their idiosyncrasies. Even the supporting cast like Dragan Armansky, Nils Buhrman, Erika Berger, etc. are from the first book. So I am amazed at how Lars fills the pages, all 700 of them without skipping a beat. He also peppers the book with a twist every 30 pages or so, to keep the reader hooked. I pretty much devoured the book during the flight from Raleigh to San Francisco and it definitely took out the drudgery of sitting cramped in an aircraft for several hours. I recommend this book to all mystery fans, especially if you have a long flight ahead of you.

Girl in Translation

• Author: Jean Kwok
• Amazon Link

I was browsing through Amazon and stumbled on this novel. It was published recently (April 29, 2010) and already had garnered a whole bunch of accolades from the press. While there were few ratings, I was impressed that in such a short time it had racked up almost 50 reviews on Amazon, with an average of 4 1/2 stars. If that wasn't enough, the story was one that was right up my alley; a young Chinese girl and her mother land up in New York, eke out a living by working in a sweatshop in Chinatown and live in a decrepit building in Brooklyn. The book promised authenticity as well, since the author came to the US from Hong Kong and had a similar childhood in New York. You can read more about the author, Jean Kwok here.

The book is very well written and it is effortless to read. I read it in just a couple of sittings and was moved by the story of Kimberly Chang. She is an adorable little girl is telling a story that no little girl should have to go through. The book made me have a lot more respect for Chinese immigrants who are all around us in the Bay area. Who knows how many of them had challenging upbringings and endured similar hardships. After reading this book, I can't help but feel that we Indians had it easy out here. Most of us came here for our graduate studies, were teaching assistants or found jobs that paid a decent wage that we could get by on. None (or if some were, they certainly are not telling) of us were exploited in a sweatshop and lived in inhuman conditions.

There were some aspects of the author's style that I couldn't quite comprehend. For instance, she would suddenly italicize certain words and spell them phonetically in a sort of mis-pronounced way. My guess is she is trying to remind the reader that the little Kimberly did not understand many of the things that were said to her, especially the words that are italicized. However, those are few and far between and not really consistent, i.e. it is unclear why those particular words were chosen.

The book is a joy to read and is quite moving. I was intrigued to find out how much of the book was really based on Jean's own experience and you can read her blog (after you read the book). The book is really doing well and made it to the NY Times Bestseller list this month. I recommend this book to anyone who is eager to learn more about Chinese immigrants in the US, their struggles, culture and society. It is a great first novel from Jean and I am sure there will be many more to come.

Little Bee

• Chris Cleave
• Amazon Link

I stumbled on this gem, while I was trying to fill my cart in Amazon to get to the $25 minimum that would get my books shipped for free. This one was highly recommended by all the top Newspaper critics and nominated for a bunch of awards. The race to make a movie had begun as well and for me that instills a sense of urgency as I am loathe to read a book after I have seen the movie. The whole premise of the book is to tease the reader with a little information that something ominous has transpired in the little protagonist's past and the author is going to release this key information at his own pace.

Now for the real treat; the book is "un-put-downable". I normally take weeks to finish a book and am embarrassed to admit that often-times the weeks spill over to months. But once I started this book there was no stopping. I had to force myself to pause after a couple of hundred pages to go to bed, only to wake up and pick it up again until there were no pages left to read. The little girl who is aptly named "Little Bee" has a story that is dripping with horrors and atrocities that you are compelled to turn the pages to learn about. The story is alternately narrated by the two main women characters in the book and it is one smooth passage. The horrors of the past are revealed in measured doses and the reader is hooked from page one. This one is a guaranteed crowd pleaser and it is easy to see how it is recommended by all the major critics and has been on the New York Times Bestseller List for several weeks now. Read this book and you will not be disappointed.

Tinkers

• Paul Harding
• Amazon Link

This was one of the easiest book selections that I have made. It was that time of year (April) when the Pulitzer Prize winners are announced and Paul Harding's Tinker had taken the top spot for 2010. It was written by a guy who was exactly my age and was a drummer in an alternative band called "Cold Water Flat" for 7 years. Furthermore it was less than 200 pages and I could probably read it in the time it would take to watch a Bollywood movie. And most important, the mother of all reasons for making this a painless selection - it was recommended by my wife, Sangeeta.

The style of the book is very interesting and after reading it I can see why it was rejected by many mainstream publishers. For the first 70 odd pages, I couldn't quite fathom where the author was taking me. After that the fog lifted and I could better appreciate the story; maybe I just got used to his style of writing. The sentences are long and convoluted and often-times, I found myself re-reading the sentences to figure out who the real subject of the sentence was. Maybe the author was charged a penny for each full-stop that he put down! Despite all this, Harding's command of the written word is evident in every page whether he is telling a story of the Crosby's or precisely describing the inner gears in a clock, or a bird's perspective on how to build a nest. There are also fake quotations from a made up book called "The Reasonable Horologist" that delve even further into the mysteries and workings of past and present clocks.

The book opens with George Crosby on his deathbed, precisely 8 days prior to his death; the 8 days is the magical number that the clock takes to wind down as well. The story alternates between George and his father Howard, and through the telling of their story, Harding makes us appreciate the world of clocks, nature, epileptic seizures, building of nests, etc. While this book is certainly not for everyone, I can say that it is one that I will possibly read again to better appreciate some of the nuances that I most certainly missed in my first reading.