Albert
Do we romanticize the Mennonite and Amish lifestyles because they live in simpler times? Seems appealing, but this book reveals the downsides. The women essentially have no freedom.
It's simultaneously too long and too short. Too long because it repeats vague descriptions of its ideas multiple times, and too short because it illustrates those ideas with superficial anecdotes. I would have liked to read more about the author's experiences in how he applied these ideas.
It was well-written and interesting, but focussed too much on art history and literary history, and didn't actually spend a lot of time on the concept of the attention economy itself. I was hoping for more social, technological and historic context.
I admire the writing. It's filled with both beautiful and horrific images, sometimes stacked together. (E.g., description of grandmother in beautiful dress, at peaceful Buddhist altar; then, the suggestion that the incense blunts the pain that she feels about her departed son.)
On the other hand, I think the lack of structure put me off. I didn't feel attached to any characters because they come and go so quickly that they leave only impressions.
Excessive worldbuilding... felt like all of the interesting stuff happens “off-screen,” at the expense of the present story.
The biggest wow moment for me was seeing the Righteous and Harmonious Fists in battle from Vibiana's perspective. They appear as men, and not as gods. It creates the sense that the Fist members are driven by faith in their cause (which I never totally agreed with while reading Boxers).
I was not a fan of the epilogue here... I didn't think that Bao deserved to survive, and especially not due to the prayer that he learned from the girl that he murdered. I didn't feel it was just; Bao was the instigator of violence, and he ends up being victorious, in a way.
I thought the ending was a bit rushed. There's a lot of moral ambiguity here, and I have to say I found it tough to get into because I never really wanted Bao to succeed. His rebellion is based on nationalism and exclusionary thinking, and I couldn't get behind it, even though on a personal level, I respect that he was trying to protect his way of life.
The artwork is great, and I enjoyed the designs of the gods that the fighters become.
When I saw the advertised premise of this book—that many world leaders are actually psychopaths—I went “Yeah! Politicians suck! Rich CEOs suck!” It would be a book for the 99-percenter in all of us.
(I was reminded of a speech that the CEO gave in the office at a previous job. Bizarrely, the employees were crammed into the elevator lobby because we had no meeting rooms large enough to hold us all. The CEO was giving his inspirational forecast for the company:
“In five years, we'll be the market leader. And our competitors... they'll be working at Dunkin' Donuts! BWAHAHAHA!!”
A handful of high-ranking execs managed some forced laughter, but most of us had no response except to look around at each other in shock. I thought to myself, “Yeah, this guy's a psychopath.”)
When I started reading the book, I was expecting a direct, focussed attack on the rich and powerful, which by the end would have me marching into my CEO's office, with an outraged mob rallying behind me.
To my surprise, Ronson pretty much abandons his thesis halfway, after interviewing Al Dunlap, a disgraced CEO. The evidence wasn't strong enough to declare Dunlap a psychopath. At this point, I could see that Ronson was struggling to keep his book on track. The point that he was trying to make had basically fallen apart.
To his credit, Ronson manages to recover. He changes gears, and looks into how our culture is fascinated by madness. A reality show producer that he interviews says that there's a certain type of crazy that we enjoy watching, because it makes us feel happy to be normal. (If only there was a word to express the feeling of taking pleasure in someone else's misfortune...)
I think some readers will call this a cop-out, but I liked how he rebounds from his failed quest by questioning his motives for undertaking the quest in the first place. The fact that he wanted to uncover hidden psychopaths means that he's part of the madness industry.
Entertainment, such as reality shows and books about psychopathic world leaders, is one side of the madness industry, but Ronson also covers a more serious side: overdiagnosis of mental illness and overprescription of drugs.
By ending on that note, I think Ronson is making a profound point: that the true madness in the world is seeing madness where it doesn't exist.
Joshua Foer writes a compelling account of his experiences in memory competition. The memory techniques that he describes are so simple that “anyone can do it,” but it takes a certain type of personality to commit that much effort and time to practicing those techniques. And indeed, the other competitors that he meets along the way are a little bit eccentric.
I enjoyed the variety of topics that Foer weaves into his story. It felt like reading a mashup of non-fiction genres: science, history, psychology, biography. Particularly interesting to me was the chapter on how the modern education system has shunned memorization. The common opinion is that rote memorization as a learning method is rigid and soul-sucking and that broader understanding is more important that knowing the facts themselves. Foer introduces an inner-city teacher who does teach his students to memorize facts, because in his view, understanding can't occur without knowing the facts in the first place. I always enjoy opinions that are counter to the norm, so this was a high point of the book for me.
Overall, this book contained a lot of insights about the biological and evolutionary reasons behind human psychology. There's one section, about the US gun problem, which seemed a bit off-topic to me, because it doesn't relate to the main theme of loneliness. It's kind of sad, that the gun issue is so ingrained in American culture that it just has to be commented on.
I didn't love every story in this collection, but the ones that I did, I loved a lot. I want to point out the two that I enjoyed most, both of which deal with anxieties around motherhood: the desire to become a mother, but on the flipside, an honest examination of the hardships of motherhood.
Full review: https://alchoi.com/blog/2022-01-09-glorious-frazzled-beings/
Most of it seems common-sense to me: communicate, be social, be open-minded, no hierarchies. I disagree with the pitch that anyone “from the CEO to the janitor” can implement these changes. You still need some power to put things in motion.
The core message of the book–that people are motivated by doing work that they find meaningful–didn't seem that insightful to me. But I did like the latter half of the book, which talks about how misconceptions spread. Ideology propagates because of self-fulfilling prophecy.
I read this while going through a bit of a mid-life crisis. Basically, coming to the realization that it's impossible to have it all. Trying to fit everything into this life only leads to anxiety.
In this book, one character after another pours their heart out to the narrator. They reflect upon their lives, often filled with regret. On the surface, it seems like they regret their failure to attain everything they wanted. But in my state of mind, I interpreted it as regret that they failed to recognize the impossibility of attaining everything they wanted. Or, they failed to recognize that they were being told to want the wrong things.
This book is filled with passages that describe parts of my life perfectly. One of the most emotionally satisfying reads I've had in a while.
Artwork is great, but writing is so-so. The narration in particular is way too direct and unsubtle.
Nothing evokes guilt like reading about poverty on a brand-new shiny e-book gadget...
The love triangle kept me engaged, even though Sid was being blindly and irrationally jealous most of the time. There are a couple of beautiful passages about what it's like to make music, and what talent and genius mean. Mostly, though, I never quite settled into the prose style: a bit repetitive at times, and forced my head voice into a mental blackface that I wasn't comfortable with.
A highlight for me in the Little Blue sections was all of the invented titles of other movies or songs.
The thing that struck me most while reading this was how much luck was involved in the operation's success. It's fascinating how such an event as large-scale as the invasion of Sicily was affected by a series of small events that made Operation Mincemeat work. Little things like finding the right photograph to match the dead body, the documents landing in the hands of an anti-Nazi German officer, etc... if any of those things had happened differently, the entire operation could have failed. The book does a good job of revealing these turns of fortune in an entertaining way so that it reads like a suspense novel.
I've spent most of my life at the intersection of Eastern and Western cultures. When I stumbled upon this book, it made me wonder where I stood. Would my way of thinking match up with one side or the other?
One of the book's main points is that Eastern cultures value interdependence over independence; that is, people are seen as part of a group. Western cultures, on the other hand, are more individualistic; success is measured by personal achievement.
Coincidentally, not long after I finished the book, I had a conversation with my grandma that perfectly illustrates this point. We were talking about work, and I mentioned how my company might be moving offices soon. My Cantonese language skills aren't the best, so sometimes there's miscommunication when I speak to my grandma; she thought I had said that I was changing jobs. When I cleared up the misunderstanding, she seemed relieved.
She said that it's not right to change jobs, because you've formed attachments to the people there and it would be hard to leave. This is not something that I'm used to hearing; often, I get advice that changing jobs will help you get ahead and will be good for your career. I might have been confused by my grandma's words, but seen in the light of what I had just read in the book, it made perfect sense.
For her, work is about being part of a group, one that is not easy to separate yourself from. According to Nisbett, this is classic Eastern philosophy. The opposing viewpoint—that changing jobs is a positive move—is more in line with Western thought because it encourages individual growth.
I wasn't aware that this was a cultural difference, but I know that whenever I imagine myself changing jobs, I always feel conflicted about the idea. On the one hand, there is a sense of guilt that I would be abandoning my team and letting them down. On the other hand, I tell myself that it's a case of misplaced loyalty: it's not personal, it's just business.
I think these two parts of my thought process directly correspond to East and West. Having been exposed to both sides for most of my life, I'm not always aware of where that line is. Now that I've read this book, I think I'll be better able to understand where my instincts come from, and be better able to choose from the best of both worlds.
It was too much description of scenery and geography, and not enough stories about people. Well-written, but I'm drawn more to the human element, which was lacking here.
I got the edition that has the “Mistakes We Knew We Made” appendix attached. I skipped it. I had had enough.
It worked for me for the first couple of chapters. The graphic descriptions of the mother's illness (“podules”, “green fluids”) were an effective, visceral way of gaining sympathy. The sympathy lasts after the parents are gone, when Dave and Toph are living in California. He says “we are owed” and I can give him that, even if I don't believe it. They suffered a tragedy, sure, but they're not the only ones to ever have parents die. The hubris is endearing until the sympathy wears off... by the time we get to Dave's work at the magazine and the extended “interview” with MTV, the overconfident tone became obnoxious to me.
I'm not even mentioning the extended meta-commentary in the acknowledgements at the beginning. Not a good start for me... I was like, really? You're explaining your themes before the book starts?