Outliers: The Story of Success by by New Yorker writer Malcolm Gladwell (Little, Brown)“The brilliant Malcolm Gladwell strikes again, this time claiming that individual inspiration has little to do with success. Instead, circumstance, luck, timing, and culture explain why some individuals, such as Bill Gates and Mozart, are able to rise above others with similar talents. Gladwell’s trademark refreshing style makes you realize your traditional perspectives may be cliched.” And Hardy Green books editor for BusinessWeek says: “Finally, for an upbeat read, consider Outliers: The Story of Success . Challenging common wisdom about achievers, he says it’s key to have the right opportunities at exactly the right time—and the presence of mind to seize them. Examples range from Bill Gates to sports stars. Gladwell ends by arguing for educational reforms that, he says, could broaden opportunity. His points are well worth pondering.”
For some reason, the following book didn’t make Drea’s list but made many others and I, for one, would never dream of not including a book by the ever prescient and insightful Thomas Friedman. His book did make Hardy Green’s list in Business Week,and Green has some thoughtful comments, as well.
Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution–and How It Can Renew America by Thomas Friedman, Farrar, Straus & Giroux. “Innovation is also vital to the nation’s revival, argues New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman. His Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution–and How It Can Renew America (Farrar, Straus & Giroux) is a call to unleash creativity—and capitalism—on the challenges of energy and climate change. The author hops from Sumatra to Connecticut and China to document the interplay of trends.” And we know that’s always interesting : Friedman’s global hot spot hop, where we can see, at least vicariously, what’s really going on, the underlying dynamics and how they do or will impact us.
more than half of these books appear on just about every list.![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=eddfc39d-6d32-47ab-ae48-4a38d654e1bc)
