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July 15
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Jeff
gave
 
to:
The Beak of the Finch: A Story of Evolution in Our Time (Paperback)
by Jonathan Weiner
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in July, 2008
Jeff said:
"I've always loved Charles Darwin's writing, but the Origin of Species' major shortcoming is the complete lack of any evidence. It is a wonderful and sensible theory, but Darwin basically supports it with logic alone.
Beak of the Finch is a shor...more
I've always loved Charles Darwin's writing, but the Origin of Species' major shortcoming is the complete lack of any evidence. It is a wonderful and sensible theory, but Darwin basically supports it with logic alone.
Beak of the Finch is a short book about Darwin's theory that focuses on recent research in the field of evolutionary biology. The book has three sections:
- Part 1 focuses on natural selection and profiles Peter and Rosemary Grant, who have spent 20 years collecting data on finch populations in the Galapogos
- Part 2 discusses the origin of distinct species and how Darwin and subsequent evolutionists have grappled with the issue
- Part 3 returns to the Grants and expands into bigger-picture natural selection questions while also touching on some new research and older, classic studies.
While the origin of distinct section was so slow it almost had me putting down the book, the first and third parts were great. The book gives you a feel for what life is like for field biologists (something I knew nothing about). And the discussions of evolution and summaries of classic studies are fun in a Stephen Jay Gould sort of way. The writing is a little bit annoying, but only because much of the Grants' research is so interesting it can speak for itself.
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Jeff
gave
to:
Setting the Table: The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business (Hardcover)
by Danny Meyer
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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Jeff said:
"Not as funny as the Ray Kroc book. Not as intense as the Les Schwab book. Not as interesting as the Sam Walton book. Still, it has a lot more food talk and that's what kept me interested. The business lessons are disposable but easy to skim. Eve...more
Not as funny as the Ray Kroc book. Not as intense as the Les Schwab book. Not as interesting as the Sam Walton book. Still, it has a lot more food talk and that's what kept me interested. The business lessons are disposable but easy to skim. Everything else in here is pretty fun and you can finish this book in one trip . . . especially if you are flying from Dallas to New York via fucking Milwaukee. ...less
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Jeff
is currently reading:
BOTTOMFEEDER: A Seafood Lover's Journey to the End of the Food Chain (Hardcover)
by Taras Grescoe
bookshelves:
currently-reading
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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April 28
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Jeff
marked as to-read:
A Second Opinion: Rescuing America's Health Care (Hardcover)
by Dr. Arnold Relman
bookshelves:
to-read
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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April 21
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Jeff
gave
to:
Twinkie, Deconstructed: My Journey to Discover How the Ingredients Found in Processed Foods Are Grown, Mined (Yes, Mined), and Manipulated Into What America Eats
by Steve Ettlinger
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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Jeff said:
"What do you do when you're on page 222 of a book and you look to the next page and it is page 254? Do you flip to the back (where page 223 is) and read backwards to the end on page 254? Well, if you happen to be reading "Twinkie Deconstructed,...more
What do you do when you're on page 222 of a book and you look to the next page and it is page 254? Do you flip to the back (where page 223 is) and read backwards to the end on page 254? Well, if you happen to be reading "Twinkie Deconstructed," you've just been reading a mind-numbing chapter about Sodium Stearoyl Lactylate, so you put the book down and never pick it up again. ...less
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April 03
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Jeff
marked as to-read:
Good and Plenty: The Creative Successes of American Arts Funding (Hardcover)
by Tyler Cowen
bookshelves:
to-read
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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March 31
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Jeff
gave
to:
Black Postcards: A Musical Romance (Hardcover)
by Dean Wareham (Goodreads author!)
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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Jeff said:
"I’m a long-time Dean Wareham fan and an avid reader of rock autobiographies, so I guess it makes sense that I loved this book. But I have to admit that I was nervous about reading it. After I read a few reviews and I saw how Penguin was marketing...more
I’m a long-time Dean Wareham fan and an avid reader of rock autobiographies, so I guess it makes sense that I loved this book. But I have to admit that I was nervous about reading it. After I read a few reviews and I saw how Penguin was marketing Black Postcards, I was worried it would focus too much on Dean's failing marriage and his romance with Luna bassist Britta Phillips. Thankfully, this book covers what I really wanted to read about: Dean Wareham's bittersweet affair with rock music.
It's clear that Wareham pulls much of his material from his diaries and I wonder if this has left us with an overly pessimistic account of life in a moderately successsful touring band. It makes sense that Dean’s diaries would be more detailed (and his memories perhaps more vivid) during periods of discontent, and I wonder if that explains the book’s focus on late-period Galaxie 500 (and that band's demise), the formation of Luna and late-period Luna. Luna's rise to popularity and its emergence as a successful touring act really coincided with the band's second album (Bewitched), and this period of Luna is almost completely omitted from the book. I like to think that during those years in the early 1990s, our memoirist, the nicest guy in indie rock, was in great spirits and living the good life.
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March 30
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Jeff
added:
The Bronfmans: The Rise and Fall of the House of Seagram (Paperback)
by Nicholas Faith
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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Jeff said:
"I read this retarded book immediately after I finished "Ogilvy on Advertising". Maybe Ogilvy's super-precise writing had left me overly-sensitive to author Nicholas Faith's biases in this missive about the Bronfman family, but it seemed li...more
I read this retarded book immediately after I finished "Ogilvy on Advertising". Maybe Ogilvy's super-precise writing had left me overly-sensitive to author Nicholas Faith's biases in this missive about the Bronfman family, but it seemed like there wasn't a clear sentence in the entire book. The author's resume seems decent enough (assistant editor of Economist and business editor of Sunday Times), so my guess is he wrote this book very very quickly. Check out this passage from the book and you'll see what I mean:
"Edgar particularly admired Edgar Jr.'s toughness as against what he perceived correctly as Sam's gently nature. In "Good Spirits" Edgar tells the story of a tennis match against a couple where, as he writes, 'the man had a slight disability making it difficult for him to shift positions easily. Noticing this I said to Sam 'you can afford to poach at net.' Sam replied 'oh dad.' If Edgar Jr had been playing he would have noticed immediately and moved nearer the center of the court.' According to Edgar Jr's biographer, however, this story seems totally improbable. For Sam was by far the better player and had driven his brother out of the game in his teens. Junior, unwilling to admit defeat, had taken up golf instead."
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March 11
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Jeff
gave
to:
Ogilvy on Advertising (Paperback)
by David Ogilvy
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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