Books

January 27th, 2006 by alephnaught

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Title: Collapse : How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed Author: Jared Diamond Paperback: 592 pages Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) (December 27, 2005) ISBN: 0143036556 This is the follow up to Diamond’s Guns, Germs and Steel . Where his first book attempted to answer the question, “why do you people have such great cargo,” this book […]

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January 22nd, 2006 by alephnaught

City of Walls

Title: City of Walls: Crime, Segregation, and Citizenship in Sao Paulo Author: Teresa P. R. Caldeira Paperback: 473 pages Publisher: University of California Press (April 2, 2001) ISBN: 0520221435 This was a very scholarly work. The main premise is that the culture of Sao Paulo is causing a segregation of its people based upon class, […]

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December 31st, 2005 by alephnaught

Getting Things Done

Title: Getting Things Done Author: David Allen Paperback: 267 pages Publisher: Penguin Books (January, 2003) ISBN: 0142000280 This is a very good book – it was recommended, as an aside, in an RSS news feed I read regularly (the main thrust was recommending a web-based list management site, tasktoy). David Allen suggests that we spend […]

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November 28th, 2005 by alephnaught

At the Mountains of Madness and Other Tails of Terror

Title: At the Mountains of Madness and Other Tails of Terror Author: H. P. Lovecraft Paperback: 192 pages Publisher: Del Rey; Reissue edition (September 13, 1991) ISBN: 0345329457 My son Nathan recommended this book to me – I had nearly finished the book I brought along for the flights and hotel room, and he said […]

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November 19th, 2005 by alephnaught

The Great Heresies

Title: The Great Heresies Author: Hilaire Belloc Paperback: 161 pages Publisher: T A N Books & Publishers (October, 1991) ISBN: 0895554755 This book was a waste of my time. The author is obviously Catholic – the viewpoint of the book is that all heresies are wrong, the Catholic Church is the one right church, and […]

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November 9th, 2005 by alephnaught

The Perfect Heresy: The Life and Death of the Cathars

Title: The Perfect Heresy: The Life and Death of the Cathars Author: Stephen O’Shea Publisher: Profile Books (May 21, 2001) ISBN: 1861973500 I bought this book at Waterstones on Kalverstraat in Amsterdam – I had almost finished the book I brought along with me (A War Like No Other : How the Athenians and Spartans […]

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November 7th, 2005 by alephnaught

The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century

Title: The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century Author: Thomas L. Friedman Hardcover: 496 pages Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux ISBN: 0374292884 I’m glad I got to read this book – I got it by responding to a survey by Infosys. Friedman ties a bunch of seemingly separated things into a […]

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November 5th, 2005 by alephnaught

The Life of David

Title: The Life of David Author: Robert Pinsky Hardcover: 224 pages Publisher: Schocken (September 6, 2005) ISBN: 0805242031 I’ve read the Old Testiment and the Torah, but I knew little about the life of the King that probably marks the height of Judaism. This book was worth reading, but I feel it rambles a bit […]

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November 5th, 2005 by alephnaught

A War Like No Other : How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War

Title: A War Like No Other : How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War Author: Victor Hanson Hardcover: 416 pages Publisher: Random House (October 4, 2005) ISBN: 1400060958 I read this book on my most recent trip to Amsterdam, and right after finishing a book on the life of King David. This book […]

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October 22nd, 2005 by alephnaught

Turing (A Novel about Computation)

Title: Turing (A Novel about Computation) Author: Christos H. Papadimitriou Paperback: 283 pages Publisher: The MIT Press (April 1, 2005) ISBN: 0262661918 I saw this book on a table at a Borders and I wanted a book to take traveling, so I decided to try it. I’m glad I did! This is a very nice […]

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