Some books I have read, and some I want to read
What I'm reading now:
The Black Swan by Nassim Taleb
On pause:
Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison
Designing Groupwork by Elizabeth Cohen
Check out my GoodReads page to see more information!
Click here.
Some of the books I've read lately:
(This is pretty complete lately, but has gaping holes further back.
And of course, I've omitted some of the pulp that I am too embarrassed
to admit I read.)
The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger (19
March 2008)
The Russian Debutante's Handbook by Gary Shteyngart
(9 March 2008)
Inside Job by Connie Willis (20 February 2008)
A Framework for Understanding Poverty by Ruby Payne
(January 2008)
The Hamster Revolution: How to Manage Your Email Before It
Manages You by Mike Song (January 2008)
Naked Economics: Undressing the Dismal Science by
Charles Wheelan (January 2008)
2007
Ishmael by Daniel Quinn (30 December 2007)
Doomsday Book by Connie Willis (28 December 2007)
The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowiecki (25 December 2007)
The Undercover Economist by Tim Harford (19 December 2007)
Mosque bye David Macaulay (December 2007)
Tricked! by Alex Robinson (1 December 2007)
Good to Great by Jim Collins (23 November 2007)
Buddha, Volume 2: The Four Encounters by Osamu Tezuka
(22 November 2007)
The Smartest Guys in the Room: The Amazing Rise and
Scandalous Fall of Enron by Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind (12
November 2007)
The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai (30 October 2007)
Good Benito by Alan Lightman (28 October 2007)
Better: A Surgeon's Notes on Performance by Atul Gawande
(17 October 2007)
Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck
(14 October 2007)
Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard by Kiran Desai (8
October 2007)
BOP! (More Box Office Poison) by Alex Robinson (7
October 2007)
Deep Economy by Bill McKibben (23 September 2007)
To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis (14 September 2007)
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by
Mark Haddon (8 September 2007)
The Fall of Hyperion by Dan Simmons (24 August 2007)
Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel (12
August 2007)
The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid
Schooling in America by Jonathan Kozol (12 August 2007)
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J. K. Rowling
(2 August 2007)
Fortune's Formula by William Poundstone (1 August 2007)
Buddha, Volume 1: Kapilavastu by Osamu Tezuka (30 July 2007)
Owly, Volume 1: The Way Home & The Bittersweet Summer
by Andy Runton (23 July 2007)
Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides (13 July 2007)
Trail Fever by Michael Lewis (7 July 2007)
Berlin, Volume 1: City of Stones by Jason
Lutes (30 June 2007)
The Book of Illusions by Paul Auster (22 June 2007)
Shadowland by Kim Deitch (21 June
2007)
V for
Vendetta by Alan Moore and David Lloyd (20 June 2007)
The League of
Extraordinary Gentlemen, Volume 1 by Alan Moore and Kevin
O'Neill (16 June 2007)
Global
Frequency: Planet Ablaze written by Warren Ellis (14 June
2007)
- Thanks to Unshelved
for the pointer (and for getting me started on this graphic novel
kick!)
Blankets
by Craig
Thompson (9 June 2007)
The Two Percent
Solution by Matthew Miller (8 June 2007)
Maximum City by Suketu Mehta (14 May 2007)
The Art of Problem Solving Introduction to Counting and
Probability by David Patrick (13 May 2007)
Moneyball by Michael Lewis (7 April 2007)
The Learning Gap by Harold Stevenson and James
Stigler (25 February 2007)
Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder (18 February 2007)
The Blind Side by Michael Lewis (21 January 2007)
2006
Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
(date unknown, late 2005 or early 2006)
Among Schoolchildren by Tracy Kidder (28 December 2006)
Knowing and Teaching Elementary Mathematics by Liping
Ma (25 December 2006)
Bloomberg by Bloomberg (November 2006)
The
Teaching Gap by James W. Stigler and James Hiebert (July
2006)
Holes by Louis Sachar (Newbery
Medal 1999) (12 March 2006)
The Math Instinct by Keith Devlin (11 March 2006)
Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen (22 February 2006)
Wicked by Gregory Maguire (19 February 2006)
Taking Action with Teacher Research edited by Meyers
& Rust (14 February 2006)
2005
Cliffs Quick Review: Linear Algebra by Steven
A. Leduc (29 December 2005)
Annie John by Jamaica Kincaid (28 December 2005)
The Man Who Owned New York by John Jay Osborn,
Jr. (27 December 2005)
The Truth About Testing by W. James Popham (24
December 2005)
Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom (December 2005)
The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros (6
December 2005)
SeinLanguage by Jerry Seinfeld (24 November 2005)
The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman (5 November 2005)
The Subtle Knife by Philip Pullman (26 October 2005)
The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman (22 October 2005)
Freakonomics by Steven Levitt
and Stephen Dubner (4 September 2005)
'Tis by Frank McCourt (2 September 2005)
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by
J. K. Rowling (18 August 2005)
Angela's Ashes by Frank McCourt (12 August 2005)
- A memoir of triumph over
adversity, the crushing burdens of poverty and alcoholism, and the
memories of a gifted boy who is now an amazing storyteller. McCourt's
account of his childhood is inspiring and heartbreaking at the same
time. He recounts meeting the people who changed his life, who are
often those who counsel him towards education and reading in
particular. Vivid dialogue and descriptions.
In the Pond by Ha Jin (6 August 2005)
Terminal Man by Michael Crichton (5 August 2005)
- Brief and fast-paced, but not particularly good.
A House for Mr. Biswas by V. S. Naipaul (5 August 2005)
- Amazing and humbling: Naipaul was my age when he published this.
How To Be Good by Nick Hornby (2 August 2005)
- Very funny; light; somewhat thought-provoking. It attempts to
raise questions, not answer them; while Hornby doesn't try to force a
neat resolution on us, I came away feeling like someone was being
rather smug (and I don't think it was me). Is he parodying Peter Singer? Now there is
someone worth reading.
A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley (31 July 2005)
Strata by Terry Pratchett (12 July 2005)
- A "prequel" of sorts to Pratchett's Ringworld
novels. I enjoyed it, but I don't think I will become one of his
rabid fans.
Snapshots from Hell by Peter Robinson (11 July 2005)
- Robinson is clearly a better writer than a business student.
Funny, though I wonder how punched up his "composite" characters are,
and his often whiny, helpless tone can get grating. Exemplifies the
life-in-a-bubble air of B-schoolers.
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicles by Haruki Murakami (11
July 2005)
Our America by LeAlan Jones and Lloyd Newman with
David Isay (24 June 2005)
How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents by Julia
Alvarez (23 June 2005)
Word Freak by Stefan Fatsis
The Soft Room by Karen Heuler
The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Steven Chbosky
The Good, the Bad, and the Difference by Randy Cohen
(6 February 2005)
Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi (30 January 2005)
Digital Fortress by Dan Brown
Angels and Demons by Dan Brown
Horace's Compromise by Theodore Sizer
Ella Minnow Pea
2004
The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown
The Pleasure of My Company by Steve Martin
There Are No Shortcuts by Rafe Esquith (29 August 2004)
Between Planets by Robert Heinlein (18 August 2004)
City of Djinns by William Dalrymple (15 August 2004)
Necromancer by Gordon R. Dickson (10 August 2004)
White Teeth by Zadie Smith (9 August 2004)
Tactics of Mistake by Gordon R. Dickson (6 August 2004)
The Pleasure of My Company by Steve Martin (1 August 2004)
Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim by David
Sedaris (31 July 2004)
Fooled By Randomness by Nassim Taleb (9 May 2004)
The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri (1 May 2004)
SABC
The New York Trilogy by Paul Auster (April 2004)
Eats, Shoots and Leaves by Lynne Truss (April 2004)
The Number Devil by Hans Magnus Enzensberger (20 March 2004)
Random Family: Love, Drugs, Trouble, and Coming of Age in
the Bronx by Adrian Nicole LeBlanc (20 March 2004)
- An article
in New York Magazine about the writing of the book.
A Sense of Where You Are by John McPhee (20 February 2004)
Luxury Fever by Robert H. Frank (18 February 2004)
A Study in Scarlet by Arthur Conan Doyle (February 2004)
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle
(4 January 2004)
2003
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde (31 December 2003)
Suburban Sahibs by S. Mitra Kalita (30 December 2003)
The Brethren by John Grisham (20 December 2003)
Nothing's Impossible by Lorraine Monroe (29 November 2003)
The Big Test: The
Secret History of the American Meritocracy by Nicholas Lemann
(16 November 2003)
The Life of Pi by Yann Martel (29 October 2003)
Up the Down Staircase by Bel Kaufman
Born Confused by Tanuja Desai Hidier
Small Victories: The Real World of a Teacher, Her Students
and Their High School by Samuel G. Freedman (20 September 2003)
Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry (20 September 2003)
Number the Stars by Lois Lowry (13 September 2003)
Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin (17 August 2003)
- A narrative non-fiction account of a chilling experience - a
white journalist darkened his skin to experience life from an
African-American perspective in the Deep South of 1959. He recounts
his own emotions just as clearly and honestly as what happened to him
- while he was disguised and after he published. His Epilogue,
written in 1977, discusses the progress, and lack of progress, in
settling the "race question" during and after the non-violent protests
and the riots and unrest of the mid-sixties.
The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger (15 August 2003)
- The first installment in my attempt to keep up with our
students' reading this year. (Update: This attempt didn't really pan
out.)
The First Year of Teaching: Real World Stories from
America's Teachers edited by Pearl Rock Kane (14 August 2003)
- I am generally disapproving of anecdote and sentimentality,
but this slim book manages to convey some lessons very effectively by
using a number of short essays by teachers about their first year. I
think you'd need a hard heart to be totally resistant to it.
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by
J. K. Rowling (4 August 2003)
- Like the next installment of Star Wars, it's something that
must be done regardless of how good one thinks it's going to be, or
how good it actually ends up being.
Bringing Down The House by Ben Mezrich (12 June 2003)
- A fast read about a fast crowd trying to stay one step ahead
of the casinos in an endeavor where the law may be on your side, but
the heavies are not. Added bonus for me is that I think I know one of
the people in the book (though names and details have been modified to
shield the participants).
An American Voter by Joan Sullivan (8 June 2003)
- Gives you some insight into the nuts and bolts -- and the
heart -- of a national Presidential campaign. By my principal.
Haroun and the Sea of Stories by Salman Rushdie (18 May 2003)
- A really good kids' book that's not a kids' book at all. It
reminded me a lot of The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton
Juster.
The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen (10 May 2003)
- Wow. Really, wow. Now I know what all the fuss was about.
Dune Messiah by Frank Herbert (5 May 2003)
- I was very disappointed by this after the first book.
Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser (30 April 2003)
- Deeply researched and broad in scope. The writing is clear
and straightforward. I wish he had gone deeper and further though.
Savage Inequalities by Jonathan Kozol (24 April 2003)
- Very depressing. The case for reform of the educational
funding system could not be more clearly made. It hits hardest when
it is letting people tell their stories. The expository passages can
be kind of wooden.
Shadow Puppets by Orson Scott Card (20 April 2003)
Shadow of the Hegemon by Orson Scott Card (16 April
2003)
Ender's Shadow by Orson Scott Card (13 April 2003)
- Pulp, plain and simple, and just as addictive as pulp is
supposed to be. They're creative, but I'm not sure they succeed in
their aim to illustrate points of military or political strategy, and
I really doubt they'd hold up to a re-reading. But they are worth
reading by anyone who liked Ender's Game, especially
because they won't take long.
The Giver by Lois Lowry (February 2003)
Love and Longing in Bombay by Vikram Chandra (February 2003)
An Autobiography, or the Story of My Experiments with
Truth by Mohandas K. Gandhi (January 2003)
- Comments forthcoming. Short version: read it.
2002
Dune by Frank Herbert (28 December 2002, Rayachoty)
- This reads like the beginning of an epic, in a good way.
While it clearly has ambitions to a broad scope, the characters and
plot are extremely compelling. It's quite good, and it's deeply
embedded in the culture of my peer group; I'm surprised it took me
this long to get to it.
The Ginger Man by J. P. Donleavy (Vientiane)
- If you want to read a good novel about an anti-hero, read
A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole. Give this
one a wide berth. I'm not sure why I kept reading.
Axiomatic by Greg Egan (Luang Phabang)
Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset
Maugham (9 December 2002, Luang Phabang?)
The Moon and Sixpence by W. Somerset Maugham (Chiang
Mai)
House by Tracy Kidder (Chiang Mai)
Startide Rising by David Brin (29 November 2002, Siem
Reap)
Ringworld by Larry Niven (Phuket)
Shame by Salman Rushdie
The first six volumes of A Series of Unfortunate Events
by Lemony Snicket (9-16
September 2002)
Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (15 September 2002)
Waiting by Ha Jin (7 September 2002)
Good Benito by Alan Lightman (28 August 2002)
From Paris To The Moon by Adam Gopnik (26 August 2002)
Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee
Shopgirl by Steve Martin
Enigma by Thomas Harris
The Moor's Last Sigh by Salman Rushdie (8/02)
The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro (7/02)
Trading With The Enemy (7/02)
The Moor's Last Sigh by Salman Rushdie (5/02)
A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth (3/02)
What the Body Remembers by Shauna Singh Baldwin (2/02)
2001
The Shadow Lines by Amitav Ghosh (September 2001)
SABC
Freedom Song by Amit Chaudhuri (August 2001)
SABC
A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry (April 2001)
SABC
The Death of Vishnu by Manil Suri (17 March 2001)
SABC
The Virtue of Prosperity by Dinesh D'Souza (25
February 2001)
The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy (February 2001)
SABC
The Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri (January 2001)
SABC
What Would Machiavelli Do? by "Stanley Bing"
Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies
by Jared Diamond
2000
The Girls' Guide To Hunting & Fishing by Melissa Bank
(27 December 2000)
Memories of Rain by Sunetra Gupta
SABC (November 2000)
Harry Potter & The Goblet of Fire by J. K. Rowling
(24 September 2000)
The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell (20 September 2000)
Just here trying to save a few lives by Pamela Grim
(17 September 2000)
Some of the books I hope to read soon:
Fiction
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
Blindness by Jose Saramago
Emma by Jane Austen
The Iliad of Homer
Jonathan Strange
& Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke
Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Enemies, A Love Story by Isaac Bashevis Singer
The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon
Kissing in Manhattan by David Schickler
Atonement by Ian McEwan
Amsterdam by Ian McEwan
Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
The Hours by Michael Cunningham
Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson
Gravity's
Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon
The House of Blue Mangoes by David Davidar
The
Salmon of Doubt by Douglas Adams
The Remarkable Life of William Beebe, Explorer and
Naturalist by Carol Grant Gould
Non-Fiction
Blink by Malcolm
Gladwell
The Paradox of Choice by Barry Schwartz
The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowiecki
Amazing Grace by Jonathan Kozol
Animal Liberation by Peter Singer
What Should I Do with My Life? by Po Bronson
Bowling Alone by Robert Putnam
Fair Game? by Rebecca Zwick
How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff
Teacher in America by Jacques Barzu
In Defense of Globalization by Jagdish Bhagwati
My Life as a Quant by Emanuel Derman
Free Culture by Lawrence Lessig
Toward the Livable City edited by Emilie Buchwald
Food Politics by Marion Nestle
Code of the Street by Elijah Anderson
Trust by Francis Fukuyama
The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs
The Geography of Nowhere by James Howard Kunstler
Salt: A world history by Mark Kurlansky
Saving Capitalism from the Capitalists by Raghu Rajan
The Discovery of India by Jawarharlal Nehru
Karma Cola by Gita Mehta