Book Reviews – February 2018

I haven’t touched my laptop in weeks because I’ve been wandering around India and my internet access has ranged from nonexistent to terrible to (now) good. This is my first day of “good” and my hands are itching to write, so let me tell you about the few books I’ve read recently.

Fast Food Nation by Eric Schlosser

Okay, I’m convinced. Taco Bell is not the gift to the world I once thought it to be.

Food is another commodity in this capitalist utopia of ours. It’s up to you, the consumer, to decide what deserves your dollars and what doesn’t. You can find a good reason to eat just about anything.

Fast food chains are taking over the world and have left vast economic and environmental footprints. They’re at least a bit responsible for the obesity epidemic. When I think about the lives of some of its workers at their restaurants and what their supply chain goes through, I am less inclined to hand them my money.

The book is kind of depressing, but a lot of reality is depressing.

The Black Swan: Second Edition: The Impact of the Highly Improbable: With a new section: “On Robustness and Fragility” by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

A book that reminds us that human beings know absolutely nothing. We have no idea about the things we have no idea about. Predictions are worthless. Less than worthless. We tell stories to try to understand the world around us, but all our stories are deeply flawed.

The impulse to go back and kill Hitler is a good example of why we’re stupid. The problem wasn’t just Hitler, it was the universe that produced him. There are trillions of reasons for everything. Katrillions, if that’s a number. Every explanation will come with another katrillion bits of nuance.

He has a lot of insight that I enjoyed, but I must admit, there was a lot of the book that went over my head. Maybe that was the point. I recommend the book, but it did make me feel stupid. I don’t love feeling stupid.

Here’s a fun conversation between him and two of his friends.

Author: If I flip a coin 99 times, and 99 times, it comes up heads, what are the odds that the 100th time, it will come up tails?
Dr. John: 50%. It’s a coin.
Fat Tony: 1%. You’re a sucker if you think that is a fair coin.

“The rules” are great, but the rules only work in the game they’re designed in. If the game is wrong, then the rules are rubbish.

He ended the book with wisdom I appreciated.

“Quitting a high-paying position, if it is your decision, will seem a better payoff than the utility of the money involved (this may seem crazy, but I’ve tried it and it works). This is the first step toward the stoic’s throwing a four-letter word at fate. You have far more control over your life if you decide on your criterion by yourself.”

The Name of the Wind a.k.a. The Kingkiller Chronicle: Day One by Patrick Rothfuss

If you liked Harry Potter, you’ll like this story. It’s one of the highest rated books on Goodreads. The author weaves an incredibly detailed world with magic (called sympathy) and dragons (called draccus) and adventure. Our protagonist is a super smart guy who grew up in a traveling show. He learns from a young age how to act and sing and play music. When his show picks up a arcanist (magician), he also learns magic.

All is well, but this is a story, so it doesn’t last long. One day when our hero is in the forest gathering wood, his entire traveling show is slaughtered. He’s now an orphan and lives on the streets for three years. Eventually, he decides to attend the university.

He goes there and wows the admittance committee with his brilliance and we follow him for a couple of years through school. He picks up a rich enemy that reminds me of Draco Malfoy from Harry Potter. Rich and vindictive. Of course he has a love interest/crush, but I find her really irritating, so I’m not going to tell you about her.

It’s a fantastic (and very long) read that I highly recommend. I can’t wait to get my hands on the second book because of course there’s more than one book.

Half the Field is Mine by Swati Sengupta

This is a book that kids read in 8th grade in a medium-sized town in India. I borrowed it from my cousin’s son. The premise is fairly innocuous: two tween girls like playing soccer. They want to play mixed soccer, as in, with boys. The message is one of gender equality with a bit of class equality thrown in for good measure. One of the girls lives in a big house and has servants. The other girl is the daughter of one of the servants and lives in a slum. Of course they are best friends.

The story was a bit silly. There’s way too much deus ex machina to resolve the situations. I rolled my eyes more than a few times. The way these characters acted was not believable in the least. I guess the message is worthy, but the execution was downright painful. I don’t know why you would ever have occasion to read this book, but if you somehow do, skip it.