Review: Xenocide

Xenocide by Orson Scott Card
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

With this book in the Ender series, it feels like Ender has jumped the shark. The action of the first part revolves around some philosophical arguing over dealing with alien species, especially when to save one, or humanity itself, you may have to destroy another. Here, we see the various permutations of 4 sentient species working for or against each other. It gets to be quite involving. Trekkies know “the Prime Directive”, and episodes that dealt with this rule on dealing with alien civilizations involved the most philosophical pondering and actions based on this belief. This Ender story is of the same family. The story concludes with some truly odd occurrences that seem aimed to extend the story, and these events appear to the be basis of the next book in the series. While it seems a pretty weak step in the storytelling, akin to “magic happens”, the next book does seem to have an interesting basis built in this book.

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Review: The Life of an American Slave

The Life of an American Slave by Frederick Douglass
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Like many of the reviewers of this book, I found this quite a chilling story. I was pleasantly pleased by the simple and very readable writing, not as flowery as other writers of the times. And the story of Douglass’ resourcefulness in working his way to freedom was really key. The part of the book that really struck me was near the middle, where Douglass is describing the first of his masters to be mean. He repeats the word mean many times over within a few pages in his descriptions of this master and his behavior. I have teen daughters that over-use the word “mean” to describe the many other girls and boys that have slighted them, and the word had lost meaning to me. But the repetition here tells the story of a master that permanently scarred Douglas, and the way he told this really made the story hit home and to bring back the strength of the word “mean” to me to include the truly heinous. Looking forward to reading other Douglass books.

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Review: An Event in Autumn

An Event in Autumn by Henning Mankell
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Mankell wrote this for his Dutch readers as a promotional giveaway. It’s relatively short, with a short essay by the author about his detective in the edition I read. I found the book was nice as an example of a Wallander story. Wallander stories are known for their description of location and the feeling of dreariness. This had that in spades, taking place in a dark autumn. I got cold shivers when reading this, and it’s the first day of summer for me now. Books in the series can weigh on you. And as Wallander ages, he is getting more curmudgeonly. Here, he is downright grumpy throughout, and to excess. There’s lots of gruff complaining. If this was the first Wallander you read, you probably wouldn’t want to spend more time with him. I don’t recall any description of food or (non action related) illness or injury, other hallmarks of the series. But as I check Amazon’s Look Inside for this book, I see coffee is actually mentioned 17 times, or about once every 10 pages. That’s about right. You need warm fortification for dealing with the approaching Swedish winter and a historic murder. The mystery itself was a little weak.

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Review: The New Gold Standard: 5 Leadership Principles for Creating a Legendary Customer Experience Courtesy of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company

The New Gold Standard: 5 Leadership Principles for Creating a Legendary Customer Experience Courtesy of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company by Joseph A. Michelli
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Another excellent case study and analysis by Dr. Michelli of a high-service company. Here, the author documents the Ritz Carlton hotel chain. While listening to the audiobook, I did not remember the “5 leadership principles” mentioned in the title, but when I reviewed them on the Amazon “look inside” peek at the book’s contents, I can see why I didn’t remember them – they are pretty obvious. The 5 principles are define and refine, empower through trust, it’s not about you, deliver wow, and leave a lasting footprint. As I review this list, I can recall examples of all of these principals at work at the Ritz through Michelli’s descriptions. This book seemed a lot like the last Michelli book I read, about the Mercedes Benz US sales operations. Both of the subjects have a lot of employees and take the high end of their marketplaces. They both charge high prices and can afford to implement methods that may not be cost efficient, but that can increase goodwill of the customer, aiming for repeated sales. From these books you learn that both companies use relationship building as a key to their business. There are great anecdotes throughout this book, including stories about the creation of Ritz’s external training center and curriculum, employee empowerment to fix customer’s problems, and having all employees understand and live the company credo. There were many memorable examples, but the one I will likely remember most is a story about a Ritz restaurant being called out of the blue by a community member asking for recommendations for where they could buy an allergy-free cake. The Ritz employee made the cake himself.

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Review: Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It

Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It by Chris Voss
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Great book on negotiations. I’ve read a lot of negotiating books. This books actually reviews many of the negotiation books of the past and describes how and why they were written and where they fail given current research and practice. The author is a hostage negotiator, and describes the book’s title as something that you tend to do with common business negotiations – splitting the difference – but that is something you can’t do when trying to free hostages – where “give me two and you keep two” is not a successful outcome. I really appreciated the way this book was written – going through the state of negotiation practice and theory during the author’s career. There were many changes in tactics, some quite drastic, and these are all explained. In a way, the reader grows in knowledge along with the author. In addition, the author provides long, detailed, and in some cases thrilling examples of his work with law enforcement, and mixes in examples from his students from the world of business, such as negotiating for salary. I listened to this on audio, but I will likely acquire a summarization of the book for reference. The concepts taught here would require practice to effectively use in your day-to-day negotiations, but they appear quite worthwhile.

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Review: 10-lb. Penalty

10-lb. Penalty by Dick Francis
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Another enjoyable Dick Francis story. Here, in addition to learning about horse ownership and amateur jockeying, readers learn about the election process for MPs in England in the 70s. This is the first really political story from Francis that I’ve read, and I liked the description of local campaigning and rising political fortune, including some descriptions of 10 Downing Street written by someone who must have visited. (view spoiler)[ In most all Francis books I’ve read (and I see I’ve now read more than half of his mysteries), the protagonist faces pain and torture as a major part of the narrative. Overcoming pain is a common feature of Francis heroes. I was pleasantly surprised to see the protagonist in this book, a college-aged son of an up-and-coming politician, to only be injured two or three times throughout the book, and only facing life-or-death injuries on the last two pages (shot). Beside that episode, the only other violence in this one is a fall and concussion, a lady punched and violently saved with a drastic tackle, and the only death in the book, a steeplechase horse injured and destroyed. There may have been a couple other tackles and punches and threatening machinery, but this is by far the least violent Francis book that I can remember! And only attempted murder and libel in this one, a minor set of indiscretions compared to the normal mystery. This one really focuses on a political campaign, and I enjoyed the change of pace. (hide spoiler)] A fun read, especially if you are interested in “retail politics” in England a half a century back. And occasional digressions into steeplechase.

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Review: Weird in a World That's Not: A Career Guide for Misfits, F*ckups, and Failures

Weird in a World That's Not: A Career Guide for Misfits, F*ckups, and Failures by Jennifer Romolini
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I am probably not the audience Romolini had in mind for her book. While I believe I would certainly fit the title and subtitle callouts, I am an older male. The author, and quite a few of her stories, are aimed at women at work, generally young women at work. How can I tell? The book includes advice and anecdotes on working while nursing and on when to wear a bra, among other things. But I still found this a fun-to-read book, filled with stories of a unique person as well as some advice on working and careers. I didn’t find the career advice sections all that earth shattering, but there were bits that were aimed at untraditional advice relating to career, such as sleeping with co-workers. These kinds of advice really just made me feel old, but helped me to understand the generational changes in the approach to work and careers. I most enjoyed the stories of Romolini’s life including her work history with a series of low paying jobs before she got serious on getting a career. There’s a definite turning point in her work life, and this could have been further analyzed. Quite interesting.

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