I'm finding that writing reviews, even very surface-level reviews, of books I am reading is helping me to derive a lot more value from them.<p>Firstly, while reading, I find myself reflecting more on the book. After all -- I will be writing a review, I need to be an active participant.<p>Secondly, I find that books will often spark some thinking on a topic and the review will essentially morph into an essay. I wrote a 3000-word review of one book[1] that diverged into fuzzy logic, theories of jurisprudence and a few other areas in order to properly explain my reaction. Right now I'm writing a review of <i>Waltzing with Bears</i> that will diverge into financial accounting and a pet theory of mine about how tools create paradigms that shape entire bodies of knowledge.<p>Third, books can often be connected to one another. I find that my reviews tend to link to each other. Not because I am trying to drive internal link traffic (I'm basically a nobody in internet terms, it's not worth the bother). But book A will have tangentially touched on the topic of book B; or perhaps book C illuminates something only poorly discussed in book D. To the point where I refer to books from before I started reviewing with an "unreviewed" annotation.<p>Finally, some people find my reviews useful. My hobby is Olympic-style weightlifting and I do a lot of reading both on it directly and on allied subjects (eg, anatomy). Fellow strength nerds have found my reviews useful in helping them select books for their own libraries. It's nice when people give you positive feedback on something like that.<p>[1] <a href="http://chester.id.au/2012/04/09/review-drift-into-failure/" rel="nofollow">http://chester.id.au/2012/04/09/review-drift-into-failure/</a>
Any thoughts on that Moonwalking With Einstein book? I'd love to improve information retention in my day to day life, especially in software. I'm not so much interested in remembering the to-do list as retaining broader concepts for long periods of time. I'm lucky enough to get to learn a ton of things every day, but my long term retention of them is terrible unless I spend considerable time applying these ideas in practice, which is often not practically possible. This leads to a lot of wasted time, it's as if I never even read the darn thing.<p>Often, and this is the sad part, I won't even bother reading something because I know I'll forget it almost immediately, unless I have a block of time available to dedicate to trying it out in practice.<p>For example, I'm really fond of the underpinnings of programming language design and compilers, and it's thousands over thousands of pages of information (most of it very interesting and useful to me), but I fail to retain the vast majority of the great info and need to continuously go back to the texts whenever I'm in doubt about something. There were a couple of valuable techniques recommended in Pragmatic Bookshelf's Pragmatic Thinking and Learning, such as "now pretend you have to teach this concept to your former self who knows nothing about this", which supposedly helps with retention and internalization into the brain's "web of known facts".<p>Is there anything like that in the book? Would it be of any help?
It's kind of funny that he recommends: "Awakening Joy: 10 Steps That Will Put You on the Road to Real Happiness"<p>Step 1: Be worth billions of dollars<p>On a serious note, I realize that money doesn't buy happiness. Proven scientifically over and over again, people get used to their situations usually within 6 months, good or bad, and get back to their "normal" happiness levels regardless.
I find it very disturbing and revealing that such a high level and respected guy did read no real book, I mean real books that will be read in 50 years, literature or philosophy, or classics like Seneque, Proust, Montaigne, Austeen.<p>It maybe he read them all already? Probably not, because if you read Austeen you probably can't spend all your holidays reading self motivation books.
Surprising to me is that Amazon is charging <i>more</i> for the Kindle version than the hard cover of "Awakening Joy" ($19.34 vs $17.16): <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Awakening-Joy-Steps-That-Happiness/dp/055380703X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1347758067&sr=8-1&keywords=Awakening+joy" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.com/Awakening-Joy-Steps-That-Happiness/dp/...</a>
I find it amazing that Bill Gates seems to still have the time and passion to read books that will help him grow as an individual with everything that he probably has going on in his life and everything he has accomplished. Over the past couple of years, I have personally have had a hard time keeping up with reading habits due to school and job demands. I still read, but look to reading as a relaxing activity as in picking up Game of Thrones for an hour when I have it. I guess that's what makes Bill Gates who he is.
It's amusing to see Bill Gates upset about college students not learning much and many not finishing. He's a billionaire. But he's also a dropout. And now he's reading self-help books.<p>I'd like to see Bill Gates go back to school and earn a degree or two. Is that a bad thing to do? Why? He obviously has the time and money. But how dare I even suggest the idea? Who am I compared to Bill Gates? A mere plebian. So why would I suggest it? Beause it would be a great example to set. In my opinion. Not sure if he is a believer in setting examples and the tendency of young people to emulate "role models". Like, e.g., billionaire dropouts.
The academically adrift book was quite interesting, although I disagree with the conclusion. For the most part, I find the first two years of college are really more about filtering out those who are there to party and those who are there to learn and get a degree. If the same results were achieved on third or fourth year students (assuming most students are in for 5 years these days), then I would be concerned.
What's curious is that none of the links to the books are on Amazon. I wonder if he did that intentionally.<p>All of them go to the publisher - which seems a bit odd.
On Kindle Store:<p>A Nation of Wusses: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007OWRBEK/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&tag=asdfdsa-20&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B007OWRBEK&linkCode=as2" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007OWRBEK/ref=as_li_ss_tl?...</a><p>Moonwalking with Einstein: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004H4XI5O/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&tag=asdfdsa-20&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B004H4XI5O&linkCode=as2" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004H4XI5O/ref=as_li_ss_tl?...</a><p>The Art of being Unreasonable: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007WLU96A/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&tag=asdfdsa-20&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B007WLU96A&linkCode=as2" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007WLU96A/ref=as_li_ss_tl?...</a><p>Academically Adrift: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004LE9ILS/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&tag=asdfdsa-20&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B004LE9ILS&linkCode=as2" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004LE9ILS/ref=as_li_ss_tl?...</a><p>Awakening Joy: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0030DHPDO/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&tag=asdfdsa-20&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B0030DHPDO&linkCode=as2" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0030DHPDO/ref=as_li_ss_tl?...</a>