Travis

Great book, with lots of great ideas. My three stars is less about content, and more about execution. Throughout this book I vacillated between wishing I was reading a straight history text and wishing I was reading a straight autobiography. Something about the merger of the two made it feel a little disjointed.

I'd like to check out Stamped from the Beginning sometime which may be more of a straightforward history.

One of the best children's books I have ever read. Highly imaginative and clever, with a great message.

Got about half way through this, listening on Audible before I just stopped. Bottom line: you too can join the new rich by exploiting other people.

This encyclopedic volume is a great introduction into the two prevailing schools of modern environmentalism and really the way modern society thinks about the future progress of the human race. Filled with interesting facts, history and anecdotes this book was an easy and engaging read although not a quick one, it took me a fair bit of time to work through the 450+ pages.

Fairly straightforward but I tend to fetishize anything European so I throughly enjoyed it. Spoiler alert...

...any book that ends with a half-Swedish family moving back to the States is a tragedy in my books.

I was a bit hesitant to read a 40 year old book on the subject of animal liberation, even knowing it was a classic and seminal work. It holds up, Singer's arguments are persuasive and compelling.
My main complaint- why I'm not giving it 4 stars, I read the 2009 edition but it really felt like no substantial updates had been made since the 1990 edition. Singer frequently talks about progress made in the late 80s, new developments in the last 15 years (since the book was published), etc, but little to nothing is said about what happened between 1990 and 2009. The basic premise still holds true and the arguments are valuable but I wish the figures were a bit more up to date.

Really interesting. More enjoyable if you put yourself in the shoes of those in Defoe's time; where blatant racism and colonialism were the order of the day. If you read it with a 21st century prespective you'll find a lot of social problems with the story.

Probably not as interesting if your not a Springsteen superfan such as myself; but for me this book was fantastic. It really illuminated the parts of Springsteen's life and career that you would hear about but never got the full story on.

A well written tale but in the end it's just a billionaire congratulating himself and justifying how selling shoes (made by children in sweatshops) serves some kind of higher good.

Extremely inspirational look at an amazing polymath, unfortunately it often reads like a Cliff Notes account of a much longer book. I suppose that's what happens when you are writing about someone as busy as Elon Musk.

Really disappointing. I really wanted to like this book and the nostalgia got me through it but my advice would be “don't bother”. Childhood is always more rosy in memory just like Maycomb was better in Scout's childhood.

I didn't really like this book but, ultimately, I'm glad I read it. I don't think I can live in a world with the amount of digital ink spilled about this book and not have read it. What I do like about this book is the larger-than-life mythos that surrounds it. It almost seems as though all the “this book is life-changing”, “I can't look at things the same way ever again” type of reviews are less about the actual experience of reading the book and more about joining the ranks of those initiated into the strange shared universe of this book and it's cult following. Having read it I'm enjoying cursing around the web carving lines down House Of Leaves reviews and subreddits. The phenomenon surrounding this book is remarkable. While I give it one star as a book I'd give it three or four stars as a shared experience. I'm excited to listen to the Poe album “Haunted” which apparently serves as a companion piece.

In a lot of ways this book reminded me of To Kill A Mockingbird, it wasn't so forth coming with a social message like To Kill A Mockingbird, which is perhaps why I would say it's not quite on that level but still a very, very well written book that really drew me into the lives of this small family.

I first read this when I was about 10 years old, I listened to it on tape to be specific. It was really interesting to re-read it as an older, and slightly more disillusioned adult. I found I identified a lot more with the main character's feelings but some of the writing felt a little contrived or trite where as as a child it was sort of the opposite.
Either way it's a fantastic book definitely worth at least two reads in a life time and I suspect I may read this again in another 15 years or so.

I recently finished “The Wizard and The Prophet” by Charles Mann, this book in some ways reminded me of that in terms of the width and breadth of topics that Johnson is able to cover and draw connections too much like Mann. Johnson does a great job of showing the manifold and far-reaching effects of one technology or discovery. Packed with facts and interesting anecdotes my only complaint was the length; this book could have been 500+ pages longer and it would have held my interest.

I think as a 13 year old I was really into this book, it's hard to say if it'd match my tastes now, but it was indeed a fun adventure.

I had a sort of a love-hate relationship with this book, and it all depends on the chapter. I found some of the chapters transformative, life-changing, and well written: full five stars! Other chapters were drawn out, loosely related and often felt like a highschool essay attempting to reach a word count: one star. However, there were far more of the really, really, good chapters then the bad ones so I'd wholeheartedly recommend this book.

The best of this book, in my opinion, is found in these chapters: Mind, Society, Politics, Spirit, and Family (that last one surprised me but it was actually quite interesting and relevant to walking).

This book was dense enough to give a very compelling overview of the history of Hezbollah. I know a lot more about Hezbollah, south Lebanon and the Lebanon-Israel history (from the late 70s-2011) than I did before. That said there was far too much discussion of military hardware for my tastes which made this read more like a typical “Military History” book my grandfather would read. Very informative but not my cup of tea.

One of the worst books I have read, hard to follow. The last third of the book was so laced with profanity it was actually difficult to follow. That said, it is “loosely based” on a very interesting (and sketchy) story about some clinical trials Pfizer carried out in the late 90s.

Perhaps not ideal to read cover to cover but a chapter here and there can be very inspiring. What I liked about this book is that it did not try to convince you that there was some key to a better life and you could unlock it with some secret knowledge only the author knew; this book acknowledges that life is hard and really bad things will happen. Actually, Holiday acknowledges that the more success we find the more trials we will pass through. This book is not about avoiding trails, it's about embracing them with stoic wisdom, that was refreshing in what one could consider a “self-help” book.

Fantastic book. In the past year, I've read two books by CS Lewis and both have blown me away. I read this book with my wife and after each chapter we'd look at each other and talk about how accurately Lewis captures the human condition, sin and suffering.

Not quite as good as Rework but still a solid read from Jason Fried and DHH.

Fantastic book, really helps to clarify and expand a lot of deep and complex theological ideas.

I really liked this book. It's a very cynical read however for me personally it resonates with my attitudes and disillusionment with the US government, ineffective elected officials, and the military industrial complex. Running the gauntlet from hilarity on a surreal level (some chapters read more like an Abbot and Costello routine) to deeply disturbing tragedy the book unearths a lot of deep questions and contradictions about the way we view life, death, and war.

I can see how this book is pretty divisive, I was pretty turned off after a few chapters because I hadn't quite gotten into the more surreal aspects of it however I'm really glad I pushed through.

The best development book I have read. It's available online for free now but it's worth purchasing (the latest edition) if for no other reason then to support Hartl's amazing work.