52) Turn the Ship Around! by David Marquet So the last book of 2019 (finally caught up on reviews!) is a book by a submarine captain about how he turned round the worst fleet in the US Navy. Of course, it's actually a leadership / business / management book which shares those lessons in such a… Continue reading Year 4 / Book 52: Turn the Ship Around!
Category: memoir
Year 4 / Book 41: Corrupt Bodies
41) Corrupt Bodies by Peter Everett The subtitle of this (non-fiction) book is 'Death and Dirty Dealing in a London Morgue' which gives you some sense of what to expect from the contents. It's also co-written by my friend Kris Hollington, who kindly sent me a copy to read, and I think he's done a… Continue reading Year 4 / Book 41: Corrupt Bodies
Year 4 / Book 26: Liar’s Poker
26) Liar's Poker by Michael Lewis Michael Lewis is now one of the foremost non-fiction chroniclers writing today, particularly as concerns business. I've read The Big Short, Flash Boys, Boomerang, The Blind Side and Moneyball. And if you haven't read the books, then you've probably seen at least one of the films. He has a… Continue reading Year 4 / Book 26: Liar’s Poker
Year 4 / Book 24: The Things I Would Tell You
24) The Things I Would Tell You ed. Sabrina Mahfouz The subtitle to this collection is 'British Muslim Women Write', and it's a varied collection of short stories, poetry, essays and play scripts all written by Muslim women in Britain. And an extremely interesting and powerful collection it is too - with a wide range… Continue reading Year 4 / Book 24: The Things I Would Tell You
Year 4 / Book 11: Educated
11) Educated by Tara Westover This memoir was a feature in best-of lists and non-fiction bestsellers last year, and it's been a pleasure to come to it, even if behind many others ('others' includes Barack Obama & Bill Gates, whose recommendations carry a decent amount of weight). The summary version is that Tara Westover grows… Continue reading Year 4 / Book 11: Educated
Year 4 / Book 6: Poverty Safari
6) Poverty Safari by Darren McGarvey The subtitle to this book is 'understanding the anger of Britain's underclass', which gives you some sense of what its pages contain. It is a journey (a safari, perhaps) through lives in poor communities, and particularly McGarvey's own in Glasgow - in that sense it is part-memoir, part-polemic and… Continue reading Year 4 / Book 6: Poverty Safari
Year 3 / Book 45: Priestdaddy
45) Priestdaddy by Patricia Lockwood This is a difficult book to categorise or introduce; I guess it's best described as a memoir, but it's also at points poetic, often a true picture of parts of America, and has much to say beyond the depiction of a family living in the shadow of a mercurial father… Continue reading Year 3 / Book 45: Priestdaddy
Year 3 / Book 44: The Hard Thing About Hard Things
44) The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz This book came to me recommended by the facilitator of the Action Learning Set I'm in for new CEOs (if I can still be counted as new 9 months in). It's written by Ben Horowitz who I hadn't heard of, but is clearly pretty well… Continue reading Year 3 / Book 44: The Hard Thing About Hard Things
Year 3 / Book 42: This Is Going To Hurt
42) This Is Going To Hurt by Adam Kay This memoir / diary of a junior doctor working in the NHS has been at the top of the bestseller lists for months, so I am late to this - or at least several months behind many thousands of readers. Based (I assume) on a diary… Continue reading Year 3 / Book 42: This Is Going To Hurt
Year 3 / Book 36: Transit
36) Transit by Rachel Cusk This was recommended to me by a friend who is also a writer (shout out to Chris), and I spotted it in a charity bookshop nearby, so here we are. Brilliantly, I now realise that I've started with the second book in a trilogy - the first being Outline and… Continue reading Year 3 / Book 36: Transit
