Hi folks,
I won’t write too much of interest today. A few things.
(1) Roberto Clemente, Cap Anson, Rod Carew, Hank Aaron and I have one thing in common with today’s post. It’s my 3,000th here. Since 2006 I have tried to post something of substance every weekday, I’ve mostly succeeded on the numbers, if not the content. I doubt I’ll make it to Pete Rose, or perhaps even to Al Kaline (what a great name by the way).
(2) When I solicited book suggestions in December I got a GREAT response. My favorite so far was probably Unbroken, which was the incredible story of Louie Zamperini. I spend lots of time in the car over the summer, so if folks are willing to suggest again some fantastic audio books I would be very thankful. All genres work.
Have a good weekend.
WC, we have not, as they say, “shared”… reading tastes, so I have to guess, assuming that my interests, being a Yuppie, are the most important interests in the world, the first principle giving me license to deny all values. But don’t get me going on Obama, Dave Axelrod, SDS, the morality of bombing and Bill Ayers, Studs Terkel, Saul Alinsky , and flipping in and out from murderous situations. Of course as a Yuppie, my feelings about literature are correct and pleasing,
You may wish to get audio versions of Vince Flynn’s Mitch Rapp series, starting with American Assassin. In this series, America takes the fight to our enemies, the people abroad who want to kill me and you and all of our families.
Linda has much fun reading these books.
I do maybe a book a week, and have wasted some time reading bad fiction. When I ran out of library books, I went to my own library and picked up Sherlock Holmes and read Silver Blaze, where the key clue is the dog who did not bark. Allusions to this clue have cropped up often in my economic reading. As you drive, maybe you would enjoy Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, if you have not already read his oeuvre.
Maybe you can, as a honcho in the Koch brothers’ empire, can get them to produce the audio version of Bastiat’s collected essays, narrated by Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia.
Books:
The Sex Lives of Cannibals by J. Maarten Troost
Exploding The Phone by Phil Lapsley
Taco USA: How Mexican Food Conquered America by Gustavo Arellano
Instant: The Story of Polaroid by Christopher Bonanos
Tigers in the Mud by Otto Carius
“A Collection of Short Stories by Ernest Hemingway.”
I will order that book about Louie!
Do you prefer nonfiction, even while driving?
Are there any Peter Rabbit/Beatrix Potter audio books? Bet my library has them, and I will give you the secret password. Your kids and you will like to review stories of unspeakable brutality.
Maybe I can mail you my copy of The Federal Reserve System, published I think in 1921. Maybe you could get the Koch brothers to produce it as an audiobook, narrated by James Earl Jones, with footnote comment by Paul Krugman, to explain the Keynsean multiplier history, and banking theory. Don’t play this audio book if you are drowsy
John Grisham wrote two books recently, one about a pitcher who threw beanballs, and the most recent one about a man falsely (? Technically) accused. The latter book is The Racketeer, and I enjoyed it, Even though the last twenty pages were predictable, there were many reverses in the plot, and there was enough development of the main character, who speaks in the first person, to engage my interest. Many great narratives I have read are done in this voice.
This is not Joseph Conrad or Dickens, but it is better than reading John Kerry’s memoirs, or the memoirs of Theresa Heinz, written in French, in the Imperial voice.
Hey Mike,
Congratulations on the post. I just wanted to say one thing (which you probably know but I just want to reiterate it here). Please do not think that the product number of views and the number of posts per se reflects the exact number of people who you have touched with your blog. One of my favorite things is to talk with your post with colleagues and friends, most of whom probably do not access the site. If you write it they will read it.
That said, one book suggestion is “The Banker’s New Clothes” its the best book on the financial crisis I’ve read so far. If you haven’t read it you should.
You should have your students read it too. (I’m showing my bias here)
Best,
Brad
I quite liked all of these. All available on Audible:
Night, Wiesel
Two Years Before the Mast, Dana
O Jerusalem, Collins and Lapierre
The Modern Scholar Empire of Gold A History of the Byzantine Empire, Madden
Infidel, Ayaan Hirsi Ali
The Housing Boom and Bust, Sowell
Empires of the Sea , Crowley
The Demon Under The Microscope, Hager
A Clockwork Orange, Burgess
All the Pretty Horses, McCarthy
The Castle, Kafka
A Canticle for Leibowitz, Miller
Augustus The Life of Rome’s First Emperor, Everitt
All Quiet on the Western Front, Remarque
Many thanks!
Half the Sky by Nicholas Kristof — I’d be interested to hear your thoughts.
250422 281328There is noticeably a good deal to know about this. I believe you made some nice points in features also. 863432
97116 43341An extremely intriguing examine, I could possibly not concur entirely, but you do make some quite valid points. 163517