‘Tis the season for end-of-the-year lists. But why let the MSM have all the fun? Herewith, arranged alphabetically, are my ten favorite books of 2009. All of these are great, and many of them make me proud to be a writer. (Note: These are books I read in ’09. A few were published in other [...]
Truth be told, writing a book doesn’t yield many moments of exhilaration. But for me at least, there’s always one: When you see your baby for the very first time. That moment always makes me giddy. (And believe me: giddy is an instrument rarely heard in my emotional orchestra.) So here, for your viewing pleasure, [...]
If you’re in DC on Tuesday night, please come out to the Avalon Theater in Chevy Chase for what promises to be a fascinating conversation with Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman about their fantastic new book, Nurtureshock.You’ll hear why you shouldn’t praise your kids but should should let them lie, why it’s OK for siblings [...]
I’m a little late to this party, I fear, but Maira Kalman’s paean to Ben Franklin and the power of invention is one of the best things I’ve read on the web in long time.
A couple of weeks ago, I got a copy of Mannahatta: A Natural History of New York City — a cool new book by Eric Sanderson. Today I finally had a chance to look at it carefully. Wow.If you ever wondered what Manhattan was like in 1609, when Henry Hudson first sailed into New York [...]
If you’re in D.C., please consider coming to a great event sponsored by the Washington Board of Trade: A conversation with Alan Webber about his terrific new book, Rules of Thumb.Tuesday, June 2, 20098am to 10amThe Ritz-Carlton, Tysons Corner1700 Tysons BlvdMcLean, VA Register here
Alan Webber is one of the keenest business minds I’ve ever encountered. When I was writing for Fast Company, he was my editor — and made me look better than I really was. Over the last decade-plus, he’s remained a good friend. I’m lucky.And now so are you.Because Alan has compiled a huge portion of [...]
With magazines shrinking and newspapers disappearing, these are tough times for ink-stained wretches. So the folks at the beleaguered Time Inc magazine division have rolled out an intriguing experiment.It’s called MINE — and I just signed up for a free issue. Here’s how it works:First, I selected five Time, Inc. mags: Money, Time, Sports Illustrated, [...]
If you’re in Washington, DC, on Tuesday February 3, please stop by Politics and Prose bookstore at 7pm. I’ll be interviewing Matt Miller about his thought-provoking [and prescient -- Ed.] new book, The Tyranny of Dead Ideas.The conversation (that is, Matt’s part of it) should be a great way to get a better understanding of the financial [...]
Today’s must-read, ironically, is an essay by the ever brilliant Kevin Kelly on the decline of word-centered, book-based literacy and the rise of something new. We are becoming, Kelly says, “people of the screen.”An excerpt:“The fluid and fleeting symbols on a screen pull us away from the classical notions of monumental authors and authority. On the screen, the subjective [...]
