The Sympathizer

Author: Viet Thanh Nguyen

Viet Thanh Nguyen was awarded the Pulitzer prize for fiction in 2016 and has picked up numerous other awards along the way.  I recently made a trip to North and South Vietnam and fell in love with the country, its people and it’s food. One of our guides in Saigon provided us a window into how the local people viewed the war and I was struck by how they still loved America and Americans. This book is a perfect double-click into pre and post Vietnam War times and Mr. Nguyen is one of the best tour guides you will find. He is the Chair of the English Department and a Professor of American Studies and Ethnicity at the University of Southern California and you can tell from the writing that he is an accomplished master of prose. 

Mr. Nguyen’s metaphors really bring out the message he is trying to convey and there was many a time when I read and re-read a passage to appreciate the depth of meaning. When he is describing the protagonist being kicked by a prison guard in North Vietnam, he makes profound observations of the foot that is kicking him. "Foot, where would we, humanity, be without you? You delivered us from Africa to the rest of the world, and yet so little is said about you". There's several more lines like this, but I am sure you get the idea already. There are many other quotes that are so descriptive of war-torn Vietnam and the one that is universally true is "All of us who are living are dying. The only ones not dying are the dead”. 

The book opens with a Vietnamese general and his near and dear ones fleeing Saigon, but then continues with the first generation Vietnamese immigrants in Southern California. This is where Mr. Nguyen is the most authentic since he is the child of refugees from Vietnam and grew up in San Jose, California. He reflects on how many of the immigrants in the United States are a result of wars waged or abetted by the United States in their original countries. The immigrants from Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia are clearly due to the Vietnam War. But I didn’t realize that the Filipinos got here as a result of the Phillipine-American war, and the Koreans are a result of the War between the North and South Korea. 

While the themes are serious the book is very well written with sprinklings of dark comedy thrown in for entertainment. You will learn about the finer points and differences between North and South Vietnam and contrast that with Americans view of the Vietnamese people.

Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of Nike

Author: Phil Knight

If you are curious about the title, let me get that out of the way. Shoe god refers to a person who "devotes himself completely to the making, selling, buying and designing of shoes.”  From the start of the book it is clear that Phil Knight is a self-professed shoe dog. What was revealing to me was how difficult it was to start his business back in the sixties. The first few chapters describe the life of a “man with a start-up company living on a shoestring budget”. I had no idea that starting a company and running it could have been so different back then. 

For example, Phil describes the many times his bankers gave him grief that he was growing too fast. This notion seems completely foreign in comparison to today’s startups where, often-times, the only thing that matters is how fast your user-base is growing. It doesn’t matter if you are bringing in revenue or are profitable. All that counts is that you have a user base that is growing exponentially. Unfortunately, the world in which Nike was establishing itself was completely different than the one we inhabit today.

Early on in the book it is clear that Phil is passionate about shoes. His whole life revolves around his business and the people he works with. There are many a lesson for folks who want to start their own company. There is no substitute for passion and it is important to hire people who are like-minded and have the same passion as you. If there is one thing that is guaranteed with a startup is that there will be twists and turns. Nike has its fair share of them and Phil does an amazing job with the narrative so you are constantly turning the pages to figure out what comes next.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and there are valuable lessons to be learned as well.

Pre-Suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade

Author: Robert Cialdini

Robert Cialdini is the expert when it comes to the psychology of influence. He has spent his entire career researching and understanding the many different ways in which we wield influence over one another and his book “Influence” has sold millions of copies all over the world and worked its way into Fortune Magazine's list of “75 Smartest Business Books”. So pretty much all of the business world has been waiting with bated breath for what he has to share in this field after almost 3 decades since his first book. I too lost no time in picking this up and devoured it from cover to cover.

Whenever I read a book I spend a few minutes looking at the title and trying to imagine the thought process behind how the author came up with it and what he/she was trying to convey with the same. With this one, there is no question that Prof. Cialdini has nailed the title and potentially introduced a new word into our vocabulary. “Pre-suasion” conveys the importance of setting the stage, before you attempt to persuade someone on your thought, idea or product. Before you make your pitch to someone else, it is important that they are in the right frame of mind to receive it. Prof. Cialdini explains how our mind works in associating things together and exploits that association to get the listener in a more accepting frame of mind. 

He has plenty of examples that make the book easy to consume and I found it to be a pleasant read. I wouldn’t say there was something revolutionary or earth-shattering, so walk, don’t run to your nearest bookstore to pick up a copy of this.

Tastes Like Chicken: A History of America's Favorite Bird

Author: Emelyn Rude

The numbers are staggering.  Across the globe a total of 27 billion chickens are eaten every year with Americans consuming an average of 90 pounds of chicken a year. Without a doubt, for most of our lifetime chicken has been the de facto meat on the table. However, it didn’t always use to be this way.  A couple of centuries ago, most Americans didn’t eat much chicken because it was too expensive. It wasn’t until the advent of incubators and large scale chicken farms that the bird became so affordable. Chicken farming has become so effective that it takes only 12 pounds of food to turn into 6 pounds of edible chicken with the whole process taking a little over 7 weeks.

This book takes you through the history of mankind and its intersection with chickens. For several thousand years it was just a niche item on the menu. It is only in the recent past that it is overtaken other livestock in becoming our principle protein. In 1985 chicken became more popular than pork and it is as recent as 1992, a mere 25 years ago, that it has overtaken beef in consumption.

Learn all about this and many more chicken tales in this book.

The Association of Small Bombs

Author: Karan Mahajan

This book has won several awards and received recommendations from the New York Times, Washington Post, Buzzfeed, Esquire and a whole list of  other publications. The title seems like a mouthful and is awkward to say the least. The story however, seems very realistic in its portrayal of middle class Indians of both Hindu and Muslim persuasion. While I haven’t any direct experience with bomb makers or terrorists, I felt the narrative compelling and for the most part, believable. 

Karan tells a great story that is easy to digest and is a quick read. In the final chapters, the story goes off-road, and Karan seems to lose control of the narrative. He has a bunch of wild ideas, but is lacking the patience to develop them into meaningful stories. Thankfully they are over quickly and he doesn't trickle them down over another 200 pages. Overall, I enjoyed the book and found it entertaining.

Bossypants

Author: Tina Fey

I read “Yes Please” by Amy Poehler and “Bossypants” by Tina Fey in quick succession and am having a hard time in differentiating the two. They both have similar themes. Amy and Tina are talented young women who broke into the male-dominated Improv culture in the late nineties and early 2000s. Their books chronicle the first half of their life — since the second half has not yet been lived out.  While their early upbringing was different, it did not stand out in any particular way from the experience of millions of young girls in suburban American. What set’s them apart is that they were not afraid to challenge the status quo and embraced the Improv culture that was just coming of age in the US. They both got their first taste of a national audience with the Saturday Night Live show. SNL shaped their careers and gave them an opportunity to express their talent and get noticed. Amy went on to make Parks and Recreation and Tina Fey went on to produce 30 Rock, which accumulated a total of 112 Emmy Nominations over the course of 6  years.

Tina is known for her self-deprecating humor and the book is a veritable testament to her style. You would never guess that she was once ranked in the Hot 100 list in Maxim Magazine, who named her the “thinking man’s sex symbol”. The book has some very down-to-earth advice and home truths that are both funny and sobering. I couldn’t help be both shocked and amused when I heard Amy say, “Now every girl is expected to have:  Caucasian blue eyes, full Spanish lips, a classic button nose, hairless Asian skin with a California tan, a Jamaican dance hall ass, long Swedish legs, small Japanese feet, the abs of a lesbian gym owner, the hips of a nine-year-old boy, the arms of Michelle Obama, and doll tits.”

Amy uses her comedic skills to make us aware of the double standards that we have in society today especially around women. She says, “The topic of working moms is a tap-dance recital in a minefield.”  To learn more about  these landmines, I recommend listening to the audio book to hear Amy tell it like it is.

Tel Aviv Noir

Editors: Etgar Keret & Assaf Gavron

I had enjoyed the “Seven Good Years” by Etgar Keret and mistakenly assumed this was another book by the same author. When I got my hands on it, I realized it was a set of short stories by several up and coming Israeli authors. Etgar had one story in there and I didn’t care much for that one. However, there were many others that were outstanding. All of the stories are set in and around Tel Aviv and bring out the vibrancy and excitement of the city life. Interestingly the stories are listed in the contents with the street names or area in Tel Aviv that they are set in.

The first story “Sleeping Mask” by Gadi Taub had me riveted and holding my breath as I flipped the page to see what comes next. One is about playing detective at a startup, another is about the boring life of a person who works in grocery store and a third is about a tour guide. Every single one of them brings out a facet of the culture that is unique to Israel. When you have a few moments of spare time, pick up a random story in this book and give it a read.

Yes Please

Author: Amy Poehler

Amy has written this book like she is doing Improv, which in case you don't know, is a live form of theater where you make up things as you go along. The book reads more like a stream of consciousness than a story or message for the author.  The most endearing part of the book is that Amy is authentic and tells it like she sees it. I listened to the audiobook which has Amy tell it in her own voice and she is super entertaining. There’s some learning moments and there’s a bunch of zingers that are oh-so-true. Here’s a sample of the ones that I am saving for the right occasion:

• “I believe great people do things before they are ready.”
• “Anger and embarrassment are often neighbors.”
• "Stop whining about getting old. It's a privilege. A lot of people who are dead wish they were still alive."
• "Nobody looks stupid when they are having fun."

The parts of the book that fitted a more traditional biography were the most appealing to me. When Amy was recollecting her childhood days, I could personally identify with all the descriptions. The lack of ubiquitous cellphones, the reliance on the answering machine, believing MTV was the greatest thing, etc. all brought back fond memories of my first few years in the U.S.

Overall, this is a romp through the end of the twentieth century and the beginning of the twenty first as told by one funny and spontaneous woman.

Hot Milk

Author: Deborah Levy

The Man Booker Prize for 2016 is going to be announced at the end of this month (Oct. 25th) and this book is on the short list. It tells a rather offbeat story of a young girl Sofia who is caring for her mother’s mysterious illness. The book is weird in many ways. For instance, the word “caring” is mostly about getting her mother a glass of water, which see seems to be very picky about. Her mother seeks out a medical facility run by a quirky doctor on a remote beach town in Spain. The narrative hurtles along with one hallucinogenic chapter after another that might make more sense if I was smoking something.

On the positive side the book is well written and Ms. Levy does a great job of holding your interest to turn the pages. It is a quick read and I did learn a thing or two about Jellyfish stings.

Burial Rites

Author: Hannah Kent

I spent a week in the summer of 2016 driving around Iceland with my family. I was enthralled with the beautiful landscape and couldn’t help but fall in love with the land and it’s people. On my return from Iceland, while looking for my next audio book, I found that “Burial Rites” was one of the most highly recommended books that you could listen to. I quickly got myself a copy and started listening.

First off, this is a rather long narrative, clocking in a little over 12 hours. Christie Morven does an amazing job of conveying the pathos in the story of Agnes Magnúsdóttir's sad and difficult life in mid-nineteenth century Iceland. I couldn’t help but reflect on the rather comfortable life we live today and how our ancestors must have had to struggle, especially in places like Iceland which are frozen stiff for half the year.

The basic premise is as follows. There’s a grisly murder that has been committed in an Illugastaðir farmhouse in Northern Iceland. Agnes Magnúsdóttir along with two others have already been convicted of the murder. The verdict is for her to be executed, but they have to figure out where and by whom. The District Commissioner Björn Blöndal decides to bring Agnes back to the region where the crimes were committed. However, these parts of Iceland do not have the facilities to house a criminal and so Agnes is placed in prison-foster-care with a local farmer. The stark reality of life in a remote farm in Iceland and the oddity of this arrangement make for some rather interesting episodes. The story of Agnes’ life unfolds as she tells it to her priest Reverend Tati and the farm wife Margrét. Most of the dialogue is set in badstofas - traditional communal bedrooms in Iceland - and most of the family is within earshot.

The book is rather dark and Ms. Kent does an admirable job to recreate the environment replete with knitting, childbirth, death, blood, piss and other gore. This book is definitely not for the faint of heart. The only reason to re-live those times is to appreciate how good we have it in our little corner of the world.

I was tempted to speed up the narrative, but quickly abandoned that as I got to enjoy Christie’s soft and clear voice as the story unfolded. Her musical pronunciation of the Icelandic names adds a richness and authenticity to the story that enhanced my enjoyment of the book.

Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End

Author: Atul Gawande

I am always puzzled at how Indian Doctors write so much better than Indian Engineers. It certainly helps that they have many more interesting stories to tell, but Atul is a master at taking something relatively simple, like “checklists” and writing a great book about its importance. In this one, he tackles our Mortality.  He starts out by telling us what the current state of affairs is in the US for people who are on death’s door. Yes, we do spend a ton of money on just the last 6 months of a person's life, knowing fully well that it is not going to be effective. Atul characterizes this as a "multi-trillion dollar edifice for dispensing the medical equivalent of lottery tickets”.  However, the even more frustrating consequence is that we are making the elderly miserable in the process. In the last years of their life on this planet, most people feel that their nurses and doctors are taking away their control and turning them into babies.

If you have parents or loved ones who are approaching their sunset years, I highly recommend this book. It highlights the importance of having a conversation with them and understanding what is important to them as they get older. Maybe there are certain things like eating food or going to the bathroom by themselves that they just don’t want to give up. If that is the case, figure out the best way to arrange their care with their desires in mind. Just prolonging their life at the cost of making them miserable does not make sense at all.

A Book About Love

Author: Jonah Lehrer

I read Jonah Lehrer’s book titled “Imagine” in 2012 and loved it. I and everybody in the world soon came to know that Jonah had made some serious mistakes in this book. A journalist from Brooklyn figured out that Jonah had made up some quotes from Bob Dylan and within a matter of days, he was publicly shamed by all of his peers.  His book, Imagine, was pulled from all bookstores. I had read the book from the library, and desperately wanted to get my own copy, as I still liked the book. Thankfully, it was not hard to find one on eBay and I quickly ordered it for myself.

I didn’t realize how badly Jonah was doing until I read “So you’ve been shamed” by Jon Ronson. Through this book, I also learned that Jonah was writing another book and I was eager to get my hands on it. I checked out the reviews, and was pained to see that the New York Time, Guardian, etc. all had panned the new book. Nevertheless, I wanted to see what it was like for myself and checked out a copy from my local library.

Jonah opens with a note on how he has taken every precaution possible to make sure that he has the right quotes this time. And there are numerous memorable quotes in the book like the one from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet — “Oh, that I were a glove upon that hand, / That I might touch that cheek!”,

The book is filled with plenty of anecdotes on different aspects of love and attachment. Jonah rolls through many experiments that seek to understand the parent-child attachment. He concludes the obvious, that there is no substitute for spending quality time with your kids. You can’t write them letters or have long conversations with them, so the only thing that works is playing with them, touching them, singing to them, etc.

Moving on to adulthood, he tackles marriage by recalling Darwin’s own admission that marriage would curtail his freedom and ability to travel the world and make important discoveries. Despite all of this warning, Darwin got married to Emma Wedgwood and she ended up helping him by reading his drafts and providing valuable feedback. They read books to each other and watched earthworms play in the dirt!

Jonah briefly takes on religion and our “love” for God. He doesn’t go into any depth here, nor does he offer up his own opinion and we are left with “you either know Him or you don’t”.  One place where Jonah spends a good deal of time on is the Grant Study that conducted a bunch of medical and psychiatric tests on 268 Harvard students from the class of 1939 and followed them for the rest of their life. These were some of the most privileged and fortunate men, and the striking thing was that they didn’t end up with the “happily ever after” ending that you would expect. George Vaillant spent a good chunk of his life studying these individuals and he wrote that even the ones who ended up wealthy, had their “full share of difficulty and private despair.” He concluded that “Happiness equals love. Full stop”.

I felt that Jonah saved the best for last, with the story about Frankl, the psychiatrist in Vienna who survives the horrors at Auschwitz and writes about it later. I loved the quote from Frankl, saying that "life can be pulled by goals as sure as it can be pushed by drives.” It is quite impressive to read how Frankl found purpose all through his life. The love for his wife Tilly, helped him survive the horrors he experienced in the concentration camp and after he got out, his purpose was to write the book that was stolen from him. If there is one strong conclusion that will remain with me, it is immortalized in this quote from Nietzsche: "He who has the why to live can bear with almost any how".

So You've Been Publicly Shamed

Author: Jon Ronson

The first time I heard Jon Ronson’s voice was while listening to a This American Life podcast. The subject was something called a "Psychopath Test” and Jon was reading an excerpt from his book on the subject. I found myself enthralled with the sincerity of his narration and got the feeling that he was telling me a story. I so thoroughly enjoyed the book that when I saw that he had another book out, I went looking for the audiobook just to hear his voice again.

I obtained the audiobook from the library and it was in the form of CDs, which are pretty much extinct now. I went through the rather painful process of converting these CDs into an Audiobook for the iPhone. It is such a complicated process that I am not sure I can replicate it. Once it was done, however, it made it very convenient for me to listen in my car and Jon did not disappoint. His very sincere tone makes you feel that he genuinely believes every single line that he was written in there.

Jon has seen examples of people being shamed on the internet and he starts his quest to find out the biggest, baddest shaming out there, so we can learn from it. There are several examples in the book and I don’t want to take anything away by revealing the details. To make it personal Jon starts out with his own tale of a spambot impersonating him on twitter. While I am sure this was frustrating and annoying to Jon, it is really trivial relative to how the other people’s lives were destroyed as a consequence of their public shaming.

Jonah Lehrer was a superstar writer who had authored several popular books until it all came crashing down when it was discovered that he had made up some quotes from Bob Dylan. Justine Sacco made a tasteless joke on AIDs and South Africa on twitter and within an instant this was broadcast to the entire twitter-verse and she became unemployable. Lindsey Stone posted her crude gesture at Arlington cemetery on her Facebook page and was vilified that it turned up on every google search for her name. There’s also the story of the two geek engineers who shared a joke about “dongles” in a Tech Conference and suddenly found themselves ejected from the conference. They were “outed” by Adria Richards and this particular story has multiple twists that I will not reveal here.

There are several other entertaining stories as Jon seeks them out in the quest to find out how you put your life back together after one of these events. While the book is entertaining — and I highly encourage you to get the audio version — there aren’t too many useful lessons that you can draw from it. Read it to be warned of the perils of the hyper-social lives we lead today.

Why You Love Music: From Mozart to Metallica

Author: John Powell

I gave this book to my teenage son who seemed to be developing a wide and varied taste in music. I was curious to see if this book would help him and me find the answer to what accounts for the diversity in our music playlists.  While I didn’t find the answer to this specific question, I found a lot of other nuggets of sound wisdom. For instance, Powell indicates that for most of us our preference in music is sealed in our young adult phase. In other words,  people continue to like the music they listened to in their youth. There’s also a good discussion on how many instruments are off-key and the human ear-brain system just adjusts for it.

Other than a few interesting patches, the book was rather boring and a drag to read.

The Gene: An Intimate History

Author: Siddhartha Mukherjee

My first taste of Siddhartha’s scholarship was reading his Pulitzer Prize winning “Emperor of Maladies”. Until I read that book, I did not believe that a single human being could both be an expert in his field and have the ability to impart this knowledge to a lay person in a clear and entertaining manner. So when he wrote another book, I was intrigued to see if he could do it again.

Within the first few pages, I discovered that this book is going to live up the high standard that Emperor of Maladies set. The brilliant part of Siddharth’s book is how he develops the narrative. He gets into the minds of the scientists and describes the environment, their interactions and finally their discoveries. It is scientific drama at its best and in many ways the book reads like a thriller.

Once the DNA chemical structure was identified, the scientific community embarked on a race to decode the genome and identify the locations of specific genes on individual chromosomes. Typically this is easier for genes that cause diseases and there are several like Huntington’s disease, breast cancer, etc. that have been clearly identified.

One  side benefit of decoding the human genome is that by analyzing the genes of a sample of diverse humans, we can make some interesting inferences on where man first evolved. Younger tribes have smaller variation in their gene pool while older tribes have a more diverse set of genes. The most diverse is found among the San Tribe in Southern Africa from where it is believed that humans first evolved around 200,000 years ago. After a 100,000 years or so they migrated to Asia, Europe and then America, where the native Americans have the least diverse set of genes.

Another interesting observation is gleaned from the very small amount of mitochondrial DNA that all of us have. This is fairly tiny — around 20 genes — and is passed on from the mother to her children. Since the sons cannot pass this forward, the mitochondrial genetic line of the mother ends if she does not have any daughters. It is not hard to see that assuming the size of the population remains constant, the diversity in the mitochondrial genes in the women keeps reducing with each passing generation and after a certain point, all of us would have descended from a common set of mitochondrial genes, which is the case today. Hence, we are all descended from one woman who lived around 200,000 years ago. We don’t know what she looked like, but the world has christened her Mitochondrial Eve.

Siddhartha has found a magical way to write about scientific history that really appeals to me. Rather than paint a chronological view of the historical discoveries, he organizes his thoughts around the basic questions that humans have wrestled with over the ages. He builds these up in a logical manner and answers each of them with the drama and flair that makes it so readable. Given that the questions build on one another, it is natural that it follows a roughly chronological order.

Here are the questions and the scientists who answered them [ Spoiler Alert ]

1. Is the unit of heredity discrete (like a 0 and 1) or is it a continuum (like paint). - Gregor Mendel and his famous experiment with tall and short pea plants (there were other contrasting traits too)
2. Once the notion of a “gene” was established, the question then is do they move separately or in packs on a “chromosome”? This was answered by Thomas Morgan through his famous experiment on the Drosophila fruit flies at Columbia University in the first decade of the twentieth century.
3. Once we knew about chromosomes, we wanted to know how the actual genes were spaced out on a chromosome? Which ones were close and which ones were farther apart? Sturtevant, a student of Morgan’s analyzed the data on fruit flies for traits that were inherited together and made some early determination of the distance between genes on a fruit fly chromosome.
4. Then you reach the question of how changeable is the chromosomal map of genes. Can some split and recombine ? Can they mutate ?
5. We now have the scientific basis for Darwin’s theory of natural selection and it is worth interpreting it again with all that we have learned so far.
6. With the basic hereditary mechanism under our belt, we would like to figure out the actual chemical composition of the carrier of this information. Could it be DNA, and what does it actually look like?  The last question took some creative genius from Watson and Crick who in 1953, proposed their now famous double helix model of DNA
7. How big is the genome and can we map an entire one. First we try some simple creatures but the holy grail is mapping the entire genome which was completed by the Human Genome Mapping project in 2003.
8. Can we now identify the exact amino acid sequences that constitute a gene and its related behavior. We know this for a few hereditary diseases like Huntington’s disease, Breast Cancer, Hemophilia, etc.  While we don’t know the function of all the genes in our genome, there will come a day when we have that mapped completely.
9. Can we selectively splice (and replace) a defective gene ? Initially this seems really hard to do but the CRISPR system has allowed us to perform exactly this function.

The last question leads to an ethical dilemma. While the CRISPR technique is used mainly to repair some “defective” genes, it is quite plausible that it will be used to inject some desired “enhancement” into our gene pool. These experiments can quickly go awry and lead us into all kinds of mess that will be very hard to escape from.

Contrary to what is on the jacket cover, Siddharth’s personal story seems like a veneer that is added to the book and is not tightly integrated into the narrative. It seemed a stretch to connect it to the book and seemed out of place to to me. The small smattering of pages that digress with Siddhartha’s personal story does little to detract from the well researched content that is so artfully narrated in the book.

The Year of the Runaways: A novel

Author: Sunjeev Sahota

It is no surprise that this book was a finalist for the Mann Booker Prize in 2015. Sanjeev has written an epic that outlines the struggles that many illegal immigrants face today. One of the reviewers has compared it with Steinbeck's “Grapes of Wrath” and I have to concur that it is just as heart wrenching to read about the plight of three boys whose families are struggling to make ends meet in India. There are no jobs in India and the future looks bleak. Each of them independently decide to try their luck in England and find themselves sharing a house along with a few other illegal Indians. Jobs are very scarce in England and the police are cracking down on illegal employment.

Sanjeev spins a good yarn (quite a few actually, but who is keeping count) in writing about the tough life that these boys face in India. But in coming to England they seem to have leapt from the frying pan into the fire. They are exploited at every opportunity and what is striking is that most of their employers (exploiters) are Indians living in the UK. The graphic descriptions of the poor conditions they live in and the hard work that they are required to do, make for some difficult reading. I kept reminding myself that I was only reading it. There are numerous such immigrants who are living these same nightmares every day.

Most of the Indians in the book are followers of the Sikh religion and I learnt a lot about their customs, traditions and charitable activities, both in India and England. On reading some of the reviews, I realized that there is a plethora of Indian words like “chamaar, Waheguru, etc.” that might confound a reader who hasn’t lived in India. Most of the impact would be lost in translation and so I understand why the author chose to leave them in. However, it seems like he may have alienated many a reader who struggled to keep up with the narrative. Maybe a future edition of the book can include a small set of definitions.

Sanjeev develops the characters really well and you will find yourself rooting for them to succeed. Overall, I was sucked into the narrative and enjoyed reading this book and learning about the challenges that are typical of illegal immigrants in most of the developed world.

The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics

Author: Daniel James Brown

I enjoy reading biographies, especially when they tell the story of underdogs who pull off a miracle. This book is no exception as Daniel does an excellent job in researching and telling the story of Joe Rantz and the rest of the young men who rowed the US to a gold medal in the 1936 Olympics in Berlin.

I don’t know how Daniel managed to learn all the details about Joe’s poor and troubled upbringing, but he tells it with an authenticity that makes you feel he was living there with him. Once he moves to the University of Washington the story shifts to the technicalities of rowing. I learnt a lot about the construction of the shell and the co-ordination that is critical for the rowers to get the maximum leverage for their strokes. University of Washington has a traditional rivalry with UC Berkeley and it forces them to up their game. Ultimately they make it through the nationals and then finally head to Berlin for the Olympics.

Their journey and ultimate victory is truly a fairy-tale that is enjoyable to read. The fact that the outcome is well known, did take away some of the suspense and I struggled a bit to finish the book. That is primarily the reason why I have taken away one star in my review!

Smarter Faster Better: The Secrets of Being Productive in Life and Business

Author: Charles Duhigg

I enjoyed Duhigg’s “Power of Habit” and felt compelled to read this new title so I too could be Smarter, Faster and Better. From the start you can tell that you are in the hands of a professional writer as the book is engaging, well written and interspersed with anecdotes to keep your interest.

The chapter on decision making is both entertaining and educational. He deconstructs a few Texas Hold'em poker hands explaining the probabilistic and psychological analysis of the game. The lesson is that we are confronted by numerous decisions in everyday life. While our brain is remarkable at conducting Bayesian analysis it can easily be biased because we inherently have exposure to more outcomes that are successes than failures. The more we stick to the fundamentals of probability in our decisions the better off we are.

In the discussion on Teams, he draws heavily from Project Aristotle at Google which went to considerable lengths to examine what makes one team more effective than another. The composition of the team didn't matter as much as the group norms. It was important that the members felt comfortable to suggest ideas and weren't afraid of retribution. It was important that everyone's opinion is heard and they felt a sense of "psychological safety" in the group.

For the chapter on focus, Duhigg emphasizes the importance of having a mental model before you evaluate any situation. He uses examples from pilots dealing with unexpected situations in the cockpit; the one who applies a mental model to the situation is best able to figure out what is wrong and can quickly rectify the situation.

Setting goals is a well established method for achieving more in life. I didn't find any new nuggets in this chapter. Also the chapter on managing others covers the much written about details on Toyotas lean manufacturing process and the success in transforming NUMMI in Fremont.

Overall, it is a good book with a lot of material that you are likely to have encountered elsewhere. Read it to be reminded about the things that will help you be more successful in whatever you do.

Narconomics: How to Run a Drug Cartel

Author: Tom Wainwright

Tom Wainwright presents a thorough business analysis of the narcotics industry. He looks at the parallels that it has with current industry mores. There's a discussion on the economics of supply and demand, of competition vs collusion, corporate social responsibility of the drug lords, offshoring the production of drugs and even the most American of all business inventions - franchising.

After evaluating the drug industry from all these angles, he argues that just like the CEO of a multinational company, the drug baron is looking to diversify into new markets. The one where the infrastructure that he has built up gives him the most advantage is "people smuggling" and you will find plenty of the drug cartels now moving into this adjacency.

Tom makes a compelling case for why the heightened activity around limiting the supply of drugs has had very little effect on reducing consumption. Instead it has greatly increased the violence in places like Juarez, Mexico. Describing the high death toll in Juarez as a result of Felipe Calderons war on drugs, he says "more than 25000 people simply vanished during Calderons presidency, many of whom have ended up in the chilled cabinets of the newly enlarged Juarez morgue”. Furthermore it has raised the street prices of drugs resulting in a bigger $$ market.

Tom explores the drug industry from every possible business angle. He has many an anecdote on the Human Resources side and claims that the drug cartels use prisons as recruiting centers. As a counterpoint he argues that “better jails make for worse job centers".

Finally he concludes the book by exploring the recent moves by a few states to legalize marijuana in the US. Colorado is at the forefront of this experiment and initial prognosis is that is working by greatly reducing the market for illegal drugs. It is too early to declare victory but Tom is hopeful that this will become a global trend.

The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up

Author: Marie Kondo

I could never imagine that someone could make a science out of cleaning up. Marie has done that and more; she has written an engaging book that is a joy to read.

The basic premise is to hold something I your hand and ask yourself "Does this object give me joy?"  If the answer is no, then you should give it up. This seems straightforward with items like clothes and toys, but what about other mundane stuff like papers and books. Marie has tips for you on almost every major category of items that might be cluttering up your home and life.

Ultimately, she reminds us that "It is not our memories, but the person we have become... that we should treasure".

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind

Author: Yuval Noah Harari

This book can be best described as the philosophical musings of a person who has learnt a good deal from the history of life on earth. Surprisingly, the first thing I learnt from this book is that "sapiens" means wise!

Yuval's prose is lucid and he will get you thinking as you read the many interesting theories of how we came to dominate this planet. For instance, Yuval presents convincing arguments that humans crossed over from Siberia to Alaska and got to the Americas somewhere near 12000 BC. Within 3000 years of this crossing, they had occupied all of the Americas, all the way down to Tierra del Fuego and “drove to extinction about half of the planet’s big beasts long before humans invented the wheel, writing, or iron tools.”

I like the way he views the advent of Agriculture as a luxury trap. It was a bad deal for the early hunter gatherers. However, once they were hooked on Agriculture, there was no turning back. The settled life and the availability of cereals allowed them to have many kids and multiply rapidly. The common man who worked the fields day and night was no better off. However as a gene pool we dominated by sheer force of numbers.

There are many parallels to the above discussion in the life we lead today. Does our hyper-connected life with mobile phones and the Internet really mean we are better off individually? We can certainly point to productivity improvements for the population as a whole, but are we, as individuals, leading a more relaxed life? Yuval clearly feels that we are not!

There are many nuggets of wisdom all through this book and it certainly got me thinking. For instance, Yuval argues that happiness does not depend on objective conditions but rather on whether or not our subjective expectations are met.  In the old days, we compared ourselves to our neighbors and there were relatively few of them. Today we are bombarded with pictures of beautifully clad, stunning celebrities that leave us feeling inferior and unhappy. So are we really better off today with all our technological advancements?

I found many memorable pieces of information that I have saved up, like “Each year the US population spends more money on diets than the amount needed to feed all the hungry people in the world” followed by the irony of how it is good for the economy in that “Instead of eating little, which will lead to economic contraction, people eat too much and then buy diet products - contributing to economic growth twice over”.

Read this book for a different view into our history that will leave you scratching your head and wondering if you are really better off than some of our early ancestors. You will find plenty of arguments that are bound to challenge the way you feel about life and happiness.

SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome

Author: Mary Beard

I dived into this book with relatively little knowledge about ancient Rome and expected to be much more enlightened after I was done reading it. My experience, however, fell rather short of expectations. While there is no doubt that Ms. Beard is a very knowledgeable historian, she was not able to educate me to any significant degree.

One of the challenging things with history, especially from a thousand years ago, is that there might be vast periods where you have very little written material. In contrast there may also be some periods in our early history where there is an abundance of written documentation, most often by a single person. This makes the view very one sided and you are right to suspect that it raises the possibility that it was produced in the self interest of the author (or the benefactor). Ms. Beard spends a good portion of the book on debunking commonly held wisdom on Roman history especially the stories around how it was originally formed. She also questions a lot of the history that is made popular by Shakespeare’s Roman plays like Julius Caesar, Anthony and Cleopatra, Coriolanus, etc.

While this book did not do much to educate me on Roman History, there are a few nuggets in the book that you are welcome to go on a treasure hunt for.

1. The origin of many popular phrases from roman history like, “et tu, Brute”, “crossing the Rubicon”, etc.
2. Why a lot of early history may be complete falsehood. Since there were no independent eyewitnesses and oftentimes you had a single source of truth or more accurately falsehood, you have no means of corroborating the story. Ms Beard outlines many arguments to demonstrate that some commonly held beliefs from ancient Roman History are likely to be false.
3. How the Romans came up with the notion of a republic complete with elections way back in 600 BC. What is amazing is that it lasted for 500+ years with very little by way of organized police. To this day, we have many countries in the world who can’t seem to break out of some kind of autocracy.
4. The many myths that exist on the formation of Rome.

Unfortunately you will have to comb through 600 pages of dense academic discussion to extract some useful information.

Body by Darwin: How Evolution Shapes Our Health and Transforms Medicine

Author: Jeremy Taylor

Every chapter of this book is filled with nuggets of wisdom. Taylor looks for an evolutionary angle to enlighten us on the causes of some of the most critical ailments that plague the human body. He starts with the well known fact that humans are comprised of 90% microbes and only 10% cells. Nevertheless the history of medicine has focused mainly on understanding the functioning (and dysfunction) of our organs. In the first chapter Taylor highlights the role of the intestinal bacteria and helminths (parasitic worms) in regulating our internal equilibrium. The depletion of some of these “old friends” can result in many allergic and auto-immune conditions.

The next stop on the Evolution Theory Tour is an explanation of human fertility or more accurately “infertility”.  To start with Taylor points out that during a pregnancy the genetic interests of the mother, father and the baby are engaged in a tug of war. It is fascinating to read how their tug of war is at all levels and first takes place between the father and mother. First the chemicals in the semen are evaluated for their fit. Then, the paternal and maternal copies of the genes duke it out in a literal tug of war. Taylor describes an experiment where a copy of the same gene on the chromosome from the mother/father is manipulated. If either one of them was silenced it result in the fetus being significantly above/blow the baseline for a normal offspring. Ergo, we really need both copies of the gene to find the right balance.

The mother rejects poor quality embryos so she can preserve her scarce opportunities to propagate her genes and maximize the potential for raising a healthy offspring. Miscarriages are very common and most of them are not even registered as they happen even before a pregnancy is detected. In the author’s words “the embryo and fetus are in a constant state of probation until birth."

In the next chapter, Taylor discusses the vexing back pains that 80% of adults suffer from at some point or the other in their lives. Contrary to common belief, the author states that the cause is solely because we stand upright. In fact, changing from a horizontal to vertical posture doesn’t change the compressive pressure on the vertebrae in any significant way. It is the leveraged activities like heavy lifting or gardening that put an order of magnitude more pressure on the vertebral muscles that can result in injury.  In case you are wondering what the evolutionary advantage of standing upright is, Taylor’s view is that it enabled us to decouple our stride from our respiration, thereby allowing us to run continuously for long periods of time. In contrast, quadrupeds can’t pant and gallop at the same time so that even the fastest animals can a sustain burst of speed for only a few minutes at a time.

The next stop on the evolutionary tour is the form and function of the human eye. While it is one of our more impressive organs, it is not a marvel of Engineering genius. The photosensitive cells are facing the outside of an inverted cup retina and a jumble of nerves on the inside carry the signal out through the optic nerve, resulting in a blind spot at the center of the retina. While at first glance this seems like a bad design, Taylor puts forth some theories on who and why this could have evolved in humans. He goes on to explain how there have been many independent evolutions of eyes on this planet, estimating anywhere from 40 to 65 independent outcomes.

No book on medicine would be complete without a discussion on cancer and Taylor does not disappoint. He points out that there are many different types of cancer and even a single tumor can have multiple groups of cells with different mutations with varied genetic makeup. Thus it is very unlikely that we will discover a singular cure for all types of cancer.

Finally Taylor closes out the book with an in-depth look at the cause and effect of Alzheimers. For me, this chapter had a very special significance as the cloud of Alzheimers hung over the last few years of my father’s life. For a long time, conventional wisdom maintained that Alzheimers was caused by beta amyloid plaque deposits on the neurons in the cortical region of the brain. Taylor argues quite convincingly the the plaque, while clearly present in Alzheimers patients, may be a symptom and not really the cause of the disease. He points to recent studies that show that in an overwhelming majority of cases, Alzheimers patients have inflammation of brain tissue and may be the result of an underlying infection that has leaked into the brain. The amyloid plaque might just be an immune response to try and contain the spread of infection.

In summary, this book makes a strong case of taking an evolutionary view to the treatment of the complex diseases that currently afflict the human race. While it is quite readable, it veers into textbook territory with a multitude of technical jargon and acronyms. Nevertheless it is a must-read for anyone who is curious about what the future medical treatment has in store for us.

Meathooked: The History and Science of Our 2.5-Million-Year Obsession with Meat

Author: Marta Zaraska

To many of us, eating meat is something that we take for granted. If you have ever wondered whether we have always been this way, or what was the trigger for us to eat meat this book offers lots of insights into that question. Needless to say, this is a question that we will never know the answer for sure, but it is interesting to see the arguments that are made for when and why this happened.

While there may have been nutritious advantages, the author also makes the claim that eating meat indirectly may have also contributed to our modern civilization. The argument goes something like this. Eating meat, tubers and honey allowed us to ingest nutrients much faster. It also required a much smaller gut than what we would need if we only consumed shoots and leaves. The net result is that our gut shrank, giving us more room for a bigger brain. Since we didn't have to chow down large quantities of food, we had more time to socialize and innovate with our fellow human beings.

We seem to have come a full circle now and eating meat may very well be the death of our civilization.  It is hard to believe this claim from the author that in terms of global warming, a single burger is equivalent to driving an American car for 320 miles. The amount of natural resources consumed in producing meat is staggering. It apparently takes close to 1800 gallons of water to produce one pound of beef. Smaller animals consume less, but they are still a far cry from a pure vegetarian diet. There simply isn’t enough natural resources on earth for us all to consume meat at the same level as someone on a Western diet.

The author spends a considerable amount of time exploring the consumption of meat in developing countries like India. It is alarming to learn that, despite the current Indian Government’s ban on eating beef, the Indian population at large is rapidly increasing its intake of meat of all kinds. This same phenomenon is true in most of the countries around the world. So unless something changes, the demand for meat is going to continue to sky rocket. This will only create more inhumane conditions for the animals as we try to build “factories” to produce them with higher efficiencies. Hopefully the western nations can reduce their consumption to offset the increase in the rest of the world. But again, that may be more wishful thinking than reality.

No Land's Man

Author: Aasif Mandvi

We all know how difficult it is to make it big as an actor in the US. It is an order of magnitude harder if you are the son of immigrants from India. Aasif chronicles the journey his life takes from India to England and then the US.

The first part of the book deals with Aasif’s childhood in the UK. It is amusing to read about the trials and tribulations of a student in boarding school in England and take comfort in the fact that despite all the bullying Aasif turned out fine in the end. His experience in the US is no cakewalk either as he struggles to make the transition from an Indian Immigrant to a world-famous actor hobnobbing with Hollywood celebrity.

The book is amazingly well-written and is a joy to read. It feels like you are having a conversation with Aasif. Whether it’s a beautiful girl sitting across from him on a train or how his Dad got fired, he will have you hanging onto every word and his self-effacing style will make you break out into a smile. If you are in the mood for some light-hearted entertainment, this is just what the doctor ordered.

When Breath Becomes Air

Author: Paul Kalanithi

This is one of those books that will touch you deeply and question every notion that you hold on life and death. Paul Kalanithi was a Neurosurgeon among many other things, and all through the book you will mourn the loss the world suffered because he was prematurely taken away from his family and all of us. The candor and honesty with which he chronicles his routine as a   student doctor and resident neurosurgeon, will open your eyes to the life and death that most of our doctors have to deal with on a daily basis. While this constant stream of deathly conditions may desensitize most of us, Paul rises above the fold in describing his reactions to the many difficult ailments and surgeries that he conducted.

Paul then takes the ultimate test of dealing with his own failing health as a patient. I have read many a book authored by eminent doctors, filled with information on the human condition, but Paul’s amazing debut takes it to another level. Words seem to flow effortlessly from his pen and you wouldn’t guess that he was racing against time to complete the book. This quote from his book, epitomizes his philosophy, "When there's no place for the scalpel, words are the surgeon's only tool”.

The Door

Author: Magda Szabo

I am always inspired with stories of strong personalities. I recall being blown over in my adolescent years by Howard Roark from Ayn Rand’s classic, Fountainhead. In this book the strong willed heroine is the maid, Emerence. She is described as almost super-human and there is a role-reversal in terms of the maid and her employer, Magda. Emerence requires references of the people that she is going to work for. In her words “I don’t wash just anyone’s dirty linen”. Emerence is clearly very good at her job, but she is also very strong willed in terms of her opinions and idiosyncrasies. The book gets into many of these episodes and you find yourself getting sucked into the daily squabbles and eager to find out what exactly is hidden behind the surface of this super-maid. What was her childhood like, what does she do at home when she is not working? Szabo does a really good job of keeping the suspense and you are left guessing to what happens behind closed doors in Emerence’s house.

This is an excellent piece of literature that was originally published in 1987 in Hungary and has won numerous awards. After reading the book, I was curious to see if this was in any way based on Magda’s real life and I was surprised to find out that there are a lot of parallels with the story here. Read it and do your own research!

The Vital Question: Energy, Evolution, and the Origins of Complex Life

Author: Nick Lane

If you think you know how life appeared on this planet, this book will make you “think” again. Too often we have accepted the glib explanation that the early earth was a hotbed of gases and liquids and magically single-cellular life came into being. Once you buy that explanation we invoke Darwin’s theory of evolution to extrapolate how 3.8 billion years later you have humans dominating the planet.

The first thing you learn from this book is that the explanation is not so straightforward. Nick Lane is on the hunt to find the road that led to the last universal common ancestor (LUCA), which is the most recent organism from which all plants and animals now living on Earth are descended from. What is surprising is that despite the huge diversity in plants, sea creatures, birds and animals we are all composed of cells that look remarkably similar. All of our cells are enveloped by a semi-permeable cell-membrane containing a nucleus with the DNA encoding the genetic code that is propagated through cell division.

First, Nick outlines the huge gap in scientific thinking on the ancestors of the LUCA. There is general agreement in the scientific community that bacteria and archaea were the first to show up on this planet some four billion years ago. Nick explains how at the cellular level all plants and animals are very similar to the LUCA but vastly different from bacteria and archaea. He believes there were structural constraints that prevented bacteria from evolving into more diverse forms. Something happened a couple of billion years ago that gave rise to eukaryotes (cells, enveloped by a membrane with DNA in a nucleus inside). Nick has a theory on how this all happened.

When life first appeared on this planet, it was in the form of single cells like bacteria and archaea. Over the years these evolved but they remained morphologically simple and could not give rise to multi-cellular organisms. Then some two and half billion years ago, a magical event resulted in a bacteria being swallowed by an archeaon. Surprisingly this was a symbiotic event, and they both thrived. The bacteria morphed into mitochondria which is the powerhouse of the cell. The DNA from the bacteria eventually gravitated to form the nucleus and this gave rise to the first eukaryotes — cell with a nucleus — which is the precursor to all the multi-cellular beings that inhabit the earth.

The book is a fascinating read and you realize the big step function that we had to cross to go from bacteria/archaea to the LUCA. Nick goes on to speculate that if we find life on other planets, we are more likely to encounter a single cellular form like what we had four billion years ago. What is amazing is how at the cellular level we are all so similar. Could there have been other instances of life that have simply died out over the years?

Lucky Jim

Author: Kingsley Amis

After reading a bunch of non-fiction, I needed to detox with something light and funny. I was browsing through the Saturday Wall Street journal and there it was. Some famous person had declared “Lucky Jim" as the funniest book he had ever read. Given that Kingsley Amis penned this more than half a century ago, I had no trouble locating a copy in my local library and I was all set.

The book is set in a nondescript College in the UK and Jim Dixon is a newbie lecturer, eager to make tenure.  The title is a misnomer, for if anything, I would say that Jim is unlucky.  He doesn’t seem to good at anything and stumbles from one mishap to another. Part of the humor is bracing yourself for the disaster as it unfolds. I found myself rooting for Jim and I really wanted to see him victorious. Kingsley Amis’ delivers the punches in the typical British restraint that I find enjoyable.

The Better Angels of our Nature: Why Violence has Declined

Author: Steven Pinker

Steven Pinker is on a mission to convince the world that we are living in a much less violent world than what our ancestors inhabited centuries ago. For shock value he describes in gory detail the many barbaric acts of violence that permeated society in the middle ages. The vivid descriptions convinced me that Mr. Pinker would be great to strike a conversation at a party. In just the first 25 pages you get a full chronicle of the multitude of ways in which Christian saints were tortured and killed and how the word “bikini” got into the English dictionary.

Assuming you have a strong stomach and get past the first few pages, you will find wonderful quotes like the one from Roman historian Tacitus: "Formerly we suffered from crimes; now we suffer from laws.” that epitomize the brutal rule of law and punishment that medieval Roman’s meted out to their citizen.  Mr. Pinker subscribes to the theory that in ancient times, it was common for complex societies to be ruled by leaders who were all powerful and got their way regardless of the impact on others. While the connection is clearly evident with the early Babylonians, Israelites, Romans, Khmers, Incas, etc. I am not convinced of the cause and effect. It could very well be that power corrupts the individual. Maybe once a human becomes very powerful, he/she becomes predisposed to violence against people who don't tow the line. In the modern world there are few places where the head of the country has unquestionable decision rights on all his/her people. Without that kind of power, we are bound to see a reduction in violence from the top. Of course, this does not have a bearing on other forms of violence and so I am not a firm believer that this trend of reducing violence will continue too far into our future.

This quote attributed to James Q. Wilson, “Social Scientists should never try to predict the future, they have enough trouble predicting the past”, is fair warning for Mr. Pinker!

Empire of cotton: a global history

Author:  Sven Beckert

Sven Beckert boldly proclaims "It was on the back of cotton, and thus on the backs of slaves, that the U.S. economy ascended in the world”. And this is no idle speculation from an ignorant cotton farmer. Sven Beckert is a professor of history at Harvard University and is a world-renowned expert on global history. Reading this book, I couldn’t help being impressed that one human being could possess and process the knowledge that is expounded in the 600+ pages in this book. Consequently, this is not an easy read and there are many places in the book where I felt like yelling “Sven, I get it. There’s no need to quote from several different history books. Can we just get on with the story?"

The story starts well before the US entered the cotton industry and it is countries like India and China that were the most advanced in growing, spinning and weaving cotton. In the early 18th century, Europe primarily had wool and flax clothing and these did not take to colorful dyes, so their clothes were drab. British colonization and some timely innovations in spinning and weaving, gave birth to the first wave of industrialization in Great Britain. The spinning jenny and the steam and water weaving machines transformed Britain into a textile powerhouse in the early nineteenth century.  The plentiful land in the US south along with the free slave labor, skyrocketed the US into the top echelon of cotton growers. By 1860 almost 60% of US exports were cotton. Needless to say, cotton was a huge fraction of the US economy; and it was slaves that really enabled all of this. According to Sven, this is one of the key reasons why it was so difficult for the US to abolish slavery.

Through all of this, Britain played the role of manufacturing by building mega factories that were staffed by mostly women and children. In some cases as much as half the workers were children who were co-erced by their parents to work to bring home some additional income. Sven points out how the history books have forgotten these workers and you hardly hear any of their stories.

The US Civil war in the 1860s dried up the cotton supply and Britain and the rest of Europe desperately tried to grow cotton in some of their colonies. None of these were too successful. We seem to have come a full circle now with almost 50% of the world’s cotton production coming from India and China again. Read this book for all the gory details.