Keep Track of All the Books I Read in 2007

OK, for starters let me say that I can’t believe I’ve only read 5 books this year. I finished this one months ago, actually, but I haven’t finished another one since. Last year, I think I had almost finished five books by Valentine’s Day. Not sure why it’s taking me so much longer this year. It’s been a very busy year, but I guess I don’t realize just how busy until I think about this. Anyway, here it is.

5. Getting Things Done by David Allen

I’m not much into self-help–type books, but I kept hearing this one recommended from various places and I was getting pretty sick of feeling like I was drowning all the time at work, so I gave it a shot. I have to say, I’m very glad I did. It hasn’t saved my life or anything as drastic as that, but it has made my work much more manageable. As I think about it, actually, I really have to give partial credit to this book for the fundamental shift (for the better) that’s taken place with my work over the last three or four months. There was a convergence of good things in February, and it’s been getting better and better since then, but this book was absolutely one of the critical things that came together then.

At its core, the gist of the book is simply a method for sorting out all the things you have to do and—as you might guess—getting them done. It’s a whole system, and unfortunately not a particularly simple one. But it’s flexible enough that you can just jump in part way. I’d say that I’ve implemented it about 75%, and it’s helped tremendously. The odd thing is, it’s not just that I’m getting more done. I’d say I’m completing about 30% more projects (big and small) than I used to. But [a] I’m completing them at least 100% faster, on average, and [2] I’m feeling about 200% better about how much I’m getting done. The book has a really interesting and effective approach to prioritization (essentially, you stop prioritizing things abstractly or ahead of time, and just at any given moment choose the one thing you want/need to do next), so I’m getting the important stuff done much more effectively. It’s also a really helpful system when it comes to getting small things out of the way. One of the best tips in the book is the two-minute rule. For any errand/job/whatever that comes your way, if you can do it in less than two minutes, just do it right now. Don’t write yourself a note, don’t try to remember it for later. Just do it. You’d be surprised how many things can be acted on in less than two minutes.

I can’t really explain the whole system, but to give you some idea I can tell you one of the other fundamental ideas. Basically, it is to break everything up into the single, discrete, physical actions required to complete it. Something as simple as buying a book, for example, might entail several steps. You need to call so-and-so or check their e-mail to see what the actual name of the book was that they recommended. Then you want to see if the library has it to check out instead. If so, you need to stop by the library at some point to get it (and you’ll also need to return it at some point). If not, you need to look it up online and buy it, or stop by the local bookstore to buy it (which might also involve checking ahead of time to see if they have it in stock).

It might sound like that’s making the whole thing very complicated, but really it’s not. Those are the steps that are required, whether you consciously consider them that way or not. And actually, you really have all (or at least most) of those things in the back of your mind when it occurs to you that you want to buy the book. It’s easy to get overwhelmed when you consider that buying one little book is going to involve that whole nebulous process, so you never get around to it. But once you break it all out, you realize that all you really have to do right now is talk to your friend to get the title of the book. That will take less than two minutes, so you do it and get it out of the way. Then if you want to check the library or the local bookstore, that’s another quick job so you get it out of the way. Etc. The point is that once you’ve broken it down, it’s harder to get overwhelmed by it because you can just focus on the single next thing that needs to be done. And that single next thing is rarely very overwhelming on its own. And once you hit something that will take more than two minutes, you just put it on your to-do list, and you always know you’ll remember it later. I hope that makes sense.

Really, this is a book that’s well suited to someone with a job like mine—where you have lots of balls in the air at any given time, and you constantly have to work with various people on multiple projects. Specifically, I know that IT professionals have formed a bit of a cult around this book (I heard about it the most from Lifehacker, a site aimed at IT folks). The Wikipedia page on it is pretty extensive, if you’re interested in more info. I’m sure I’ve talked too much about it already.

Oh, and one more thing. I’ve said once or twice before that I like to judge books by their covers. If I hadn’t heard so much about this book without ever seeing it, there’s no way I would have gotten it. The cover you see above is horrible, and it’s quite an improvement over the hardbound cover that was on the one I got from the library. Oh well.

Ratings
Interest: 3/3
Significance: 2.5/3
Recommendation: 2.5/3
Overall: 4.5/5

For me the book was a fairly compelling read. I began implementing stuff pretty quickly after I started it, and so I was always pretty anxious to see what was next. The book isn’t all that significant, I suppose, as far as tackling any deep philosophical issues or anything. But it does present a way of approaching the world, and one that has had a significant impact for me as an individual living my life. As far as whether I’d recommend it, it’s hard to say. I’d strongly recommend it to anyone in my field, or who has a job with similar requirements. But when my wife started looking at it, we both quickly realized that it really wasn’t suited to the kind of work she does. Still, it’s also designed to help with your life outside work, and in that regard I think it would be good for most people. So I’m recommending it pretty strongly. I’m holding back a half-point just to prove that I didn’t drink the Kool-Aid. Which is probably not true, but whatever.

4. Tell Me a Riddle by Tillie Olsen

In my continuing attempt to read things with some Nebraska connection, and also (mostly) in honor of Olsen’s passing at the beginning of the year, I thought I would read something from her. It turns out that this is really her only completed book of fiction, so I suppose it’s not unusual that this is the one I would settle on. Having read the book, in any case, there is one thing I can say for sure: Holy hell, this woman could write. I’m not sure I’ve ever read a more powerful collection of stories. She has an incredibly tight grip on the human psyche, and from the very first page she takes you exactly where she wants you to go. Not to say that the writing is manipulative. It’s just so evocative and compelling. If you don’t cry while reading this book, you’re not human. When I finished the last (and most gripping) story, I was physically unable to rise from the chair.

In case you hadn’t guessed, this isn’t a real light, cheery book. This may give you some sense: I found myself thinking, throughout the book, that Olsen is the writer Annie Proulx wishes she could be. There are several significant differences between the two (not least that Olsen is simply a better writer), but the one that stands out for me most now that I’ve finished the book is that Olsen’s writing—while every bit as depressing as Proulx’s—has more to it. After reading Annie Proulx, you get this feeling that someone has just drug you to the ground and kicked the hell out of you for no good reason. With Olsen, on the other hand, it’s more like you’ve spent time with an angel, or even a god, who has managed to illuminate for you some of the inner workings of the world and the human mind. There is a sadness which suffuses the book, but that’s not its goal.

I’m not sure why I’m spending so much time comparing these two authors, in any case. But there you go.

Ratings
Interest: 3/3
Significance: 3/3
Recommendation: 2.5/3
Overall: 4.5/5

I’m not sure I need to say more about my level of interest in the book. I have hardly touched, though, on the book’s significance. In each of the stories in this book, Olsen successfully takes on at least one really big issue—motherhood, alcoholism, American race relations, aging, gender relations, and others. Without question, this book changed my way of viewing the world. I would recommend it to almost anyone, except that group of people who just really don’t want to read anything too sad. I don’t know many of those people, but they do exist and once in a while I wonder if maybe they have a point. So that’s the missing .5 from this book’s otherwise perfect score.

So, I went from one of the worst books I’ll read all year (I hope) to one of the best books I’ll read all year (I expect). What next? At home, I’ve started Jonathan Kozol’s Amazing Grace. I may take that to work (where I just finished this book), or I may start Susan Sontag’s On Photography. Dunno yet.

3. In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash by Jean Shepherd

I actually started reading this just before Christmas, but kept putting it down to read/finish other things. In case you’re not at all familiar with it, this is the book that the movie The Christmas Story is based on. My advice: If you like that movie, avoid this book. If you don’t like that movie, forget this book exists.

The cover blurb says that Shepherd bridges the gap between James Thurber and David Sedaris. But he’s neither as concise as Thurber nor as interesting as Sedaris. Neither is he as funny nor original as either one of them. Basically, Shepherd has maybe a half-dozen humorist tricks that he uses over and over again. If you’ve seen the movie, you’ll recognize them. There’s the “stuff of legend” trick, for example, where he remarks in one way or another that a particular event is still part of the lore of Cleveland Street to this day. Funny in the movie, not so much in the book—especially by the seventh time he uses it. There are a very few others, and these are the devices he turns to over and over again throughout the book.

And don’t even get me started on the frame. I’m not a big fan of the frame as a storytelling device anyway, but (a) Shepherd’s particular frame is a really lame one, and (2) he’s not satisfied with just one frame, so most of the book exists within a double frame. Basically, the premise of the book is that he’s going back to his hometown and hooking up with an old friend (Flick, who’s in the movie) for drinks. They are bullshitting and Shepherd completely dominates the conversation with wistful stories from their youth. But he begins most of these stories for Flick by talking about some event that’s happened to him recently in his Life in the Big City. This is the double frame I’m referring to. You can imagine how annoying this gets.

I could go on and on, but I won’t. It’s a crappy book, and I only bothered finishing about 3/4 of it. It’s pretty rare that I consciously give up on a book, but I just can’t waste any more time with this one.

Ratings
Interest: 1/3
Significance: .5/3
Recommendation: 0/3
Overall: .5/5

I give it a point for those few moments when it’s actually funny. There is one chapter in particular which made me laugh out loud a couple of times. But as a whole it was just not very fun to read. Shepherd isn’t a likable narrator, and when he tells several stories in a row (as he does here), the simplicity of his style becomes all too apparent. There is probably something slightly significant to the book, and I gave it a half-point because it’s within the margin of error. I would recommend it to absolutely no one, though, and if anyone out there is planning on reading it, let me suggest literally anything else. My only hope is that it doesn’t sour me on the movie.

After putting this down, I started Tillie Olsen’s Tell Me a Riddle. Talk about a change of pace. I got whiplash from the sudden talent differential. I’ll be finishing that one pretty soon.

2. Hegemony or Survival by Noam Chomsky

In case you’re not familiar, this is the book that Hugo Chavez cited at the UN, the day he was railing against the US and calling Dubya the devil and whatever else. A group here in town was doing kind of an impromptu book-group reading of it, so I thought I’d join in. I knew that few of them had read Chomsky before, and being liberals I wondered what they’d think. Personally, I’m a little ways left of liberal, but I’m not the world’s biggest Chomsky fan. Before this one I had read some short stuff from him, seen/heard a few interviews, and read about 2/3 of Manufacturing Consent. That last one, especially, I’m not a fan of. It’s propaganda, if you ask me. This is part of my reason for wanting to be in this group, was so that there would be at least one critical voice there.

I was surprised how little the book bothered me, though. It does have those propagandist moments. One of his favorite rhetorical tools, for example, is to choose “just a sample” of world events that illustrate his point on something. But it’s so transparent; you can find a set of world events to prove virtually any thesis. Some of his “samples” seem pretty well representative, and others seem to be just the cherries that were ripe enough to serve.

The other thing you always expect from Chomsky, of course, is that he’ll thoroughly depress you. Which he did—maybe not “thoroughly,” I guess, but there’s certainly plenty here to be depressed about. In spite of the page and a half at the end of the book where he says, “But things aren’t so bad, because people always try to make the world a better place. The end.” But there are things to build some hope on, too. He makes an observation early on, for example, about the level of criticism of the war in Iraq. People often compare it to Vietnam, with desperate questions as to why the American public aren’t getting as worked up this time around. But the fact is that by the time we were this deep in Vietnam, the public was still hardly taking any notice at all. Lots more people had died on both sides before there was a real public backlash in that case. This time around, there were protests even before the initial invasion.

Still, if you’re not already inclined to believe the “positives” to which he appeals and/or alludes, you’re going to think the world is going straight to Hell. He does an exhaustive job of detailing the ways. I’m not sure where I am in that regard, so I did find it slightly depressing. But still quite good.

Ratings
Interest: 2/3
Significance: 2.5/3
Recommendation: 2/3
Overall: 4/5

It was a pretty compelling read, if you’re at all into world affairs and politics. I had problems with various things, but nothing that made me want to stop reading at all. The significance speaks for itself, though I don’t know how much it has actually spurred me to action. I could certainly see it having the opposite effect, if I had found it more depressing. I would recommend it to people interested in the aforementioned subjects, but obviously it’s not a book with a real wide target audience.

Since I was trying to read this for the discussion group (which hardly ended up touching on the book itself at all, fwiw), it was all I was reading both at work and at home. At work I’ve moved on to Tillie Olsen’s Tell Me a Riddle, which I’ll actually finish soon. At home I’m not yet sure what I’ll read next. Most likely something for homeschooling the kids, which I may or may not post about here.

1. Once Upon a Town by Bob Greene

Yes, I did start this this year. So yes, I did finish it in four days. No, that’s not typical for me. If it were, my goal would be 100 books this year rather than 30. Basically, I’ve had plenty of time the last few days. Now, on to the book itself.

As I mentioned in my last post, this is the first of several books about Nebraska (or the High Plains) that I hope to read this year. I have to say, I hope it’s not the best of them. I was all excited when I found it; I was just poking around the bookstore in Omaha where I used to work, and I ran across a book about North Platte that was a NYT Bestseller. Man, I thought, this is going to be good. I should have known better.

The book concerns a phenomenon that took place in North Platte (current population ~ 24,000) during WWII. It was a central stopping point for the troop trains that took armed-services personnel across the country. Trains would stop briefly at the station in North Platte, and the residents of the area began a program called the Canteen, where they would provide free food, drinks, magazines, etc. for the boys on the trains. It really was quite a thing—it was in operation from Christmas Day, 1941 through April 1, 1946, and they greeted every single train in that period (they served somewhere around 6.5 million soldiers total). All the provisions came from volunteers’ own pockets, and this was during a time of rationing when people were having a hard time anyway.

So the subject is interesting enough. My problem was Greene’s approach. I should have guessed it from the first chapter, but it took a little longer. Basically, what this book amounts to is a huge sob story about how people used to be nice to each other, and Everything Was So Much Better Then. Even that simplistic message, for what it’s worth, gets muddled by his memoirist style, in which he roams aimlessly around current-day North Platte bemoaning the lack of Studebakers and bobby socks. I’m not a big fan of nostalgia anyway, and this was the worst kind. What kept me reading was the actual purported subject: the Canteen itself. Beyond that, I would never have bothered with more than a couple of chapters. But the stories are interesting, affecting, and worth reading for.

By the way, though, this book has the absolute worst ending I’ve ever seen. He actually quotes the rock group Kansas to close it. “All we are is dust in the wind.” I’m not kidding. He and his editor should both be run out of the business for that bit of bathos. Frankly, everyone down to the typesetter should be. Someone should have stepped in and stopped it.

Ratings
Interest: 2/3
Significance: 1.5/3
Recommendation: 2/3
Overall: 3/5

It was interesting in spite of the author’s best efforts to make it otherwise. The story itself is, I think, more relevant than he makes it. So I’d like to give it more points for significance, but I’ll wait for a better book on this same subject. I would recommend it to anyone for whom WWII nostalgia runs deep, or for people like me who really want to know about Nebraska history. But not for general audiences. I can see why it’s a NYT bestseller, but I’d like to think I’m more discerning than the typical NYT bestseller list. All in all, not an auspicious beginning to the year. But it’s bound to go up from here.

Next up here at home, I’m going to finish a book that I started in December (from Jean Shepherd, so nothing much). Then, in honor of Tillie Olsen’s recent passing—and in consideration of my subgoal of reading Nebraska writings—I’m going to read a collection from her. Probably Tell Me a Riddle. I’ve always meant to read some of her stuff, so it seems just right.

I’m gonna shoot for 30 again this year. I tried last year, and made it as far as 25. Which, I have to say, is more than any two previous years of my life (including undergrad as an English major, and grad school—I was a bad student and got away with it).

I want to read more about Nebraska this year. Read one last year (The Children’s Blizzard) and really enjoyed it. I’m starting off this year with Once Upon a Town. I also have a couple of books about war that I want to read—Paco’s Story and A Rumour of War. And I want to read at least three good parenting books—even just reading them keeps me thinking proactively about raising my kids, and that’s a good thing.

Beyond that, I’ll just keep working on the TBR list.

By the way, the first book I finished this year actually ended up on last year’s list (where it belonged).