How to Talk About Books You Haven’t Read by Pierre Bayard

Bayard, Pierre. How to Talk About Books You Haven’t Read. Trans. Jeffrey Mehlman. New York: Bloomsbury, 2007.

Regarding talking about books you haven’t read, Pierre Bayard might echo the Nike slogan, “Just do it.” Books are so much a part of a larger culture, so quickly forgotten and so interpreted through the internal experiences of readers that having read one brings little advantage to discussing it.

How to Talk About Books You Haven’t Read has three major parts, possibly an accidental homage to the lessons of a composition class. Bayard considers the issue of reading and non-reading (and how hard it is to tell one from the other), the social context of talking about non-read books and offers a new model for discussing books.

Reading is largely a matter of non-reading. We can’t possibly read every book there is, so the choice to read some is necessarily a choice to not read others, and a cultured person may choose to not read any of them. We may read every page or skim, and skimming may be a better way to understand a book as a whole. Even when we read a book, we immediately start to forget it. We hear about books we haven’t read.

This puts us in the position of talking about books we haven’t read (at all, or just skimmed, or forgot) whenever we discuss books. Bayard describes several such social situations, throughout building a case that what we really end up discussing is virtual book, made up of our own internal conceptions of the book and its place in the common library of our culture (including other books we probably haven’t read). He argues that we can’t exactly discuss a book because of all the factors of non-reading. Instead, a book becomes a pretext for discussion, a mental place for building common ground for communication (or so completely devoid of common understanding that people end up talking to themselves in exchanges with others).

In light of all of this, Bayard recommends laying aside the grade school shame of non-reading and discussing books anyway. He carries this pretty far, arguing that books are not fixed and we invent books out of our non-reading rather that discuss the books themselves. Discussions about books are really means of discovering and expressing ourselves.

Bayard can make our interactions with books seem so abstract and subjective that it may truly be best to not read them at all. Since he is a literature professor and an author, he probably doesn’t want people to actually go that far. His point is to get away from a narrow view of books and reading that limits the way people talk about them and move toward more creative and cultured engagement.

The Man Who Loved Books too Much by Allison Hoover Bartlett

Bartlett, Allison Hoover. The Man Who Loved Books too Much: The True Story of a Thief, a Detective, and a World of Literary Obsession. New York: Riverhead, 2009.

I like books. You probably do, too. People like books for different reason. I, and many people I know, love reading. Others enjoy and appreciate books as pieces of history, as art, for associations with their authors or previous owners, as objects with various qualities.

Some people own books because of what the books they own say about them. John Gilkey is such a person. The down side of books is they can be expensive, especially fine are rare books that might burnish the image of their owners. Gilkey had a unique way of overcoming this obstacle. He stole books.


Bartlett seems reluctant to focus on Gilkey. It’s partly because she is reluctant to seem to glorify a criminal or give an outlet to a criminal who is intent on burnishing his image. It’s also because the true story has other interesting participants, especially bookseller Ken Sander who has taken upon himself to track down book thieves. She also seeks to understand the kind of compulsion that goes into collecting, especially when that compulsion drives someone to crime.

It’s a little scary how easily Gilkey accomplished fraud and theft. He took the opportunity to steal a little information, and then picked up the phone to use it to steal books. What is scarier is his capacity for self-justification. Self-justification is a common human activity, but Gilkey has mastered it such a degree that he seems to have almost no conscience. It may be good fortune that his fixation is books and the easy criminal, but not violent, way of acquiring them.

The book is weakest in this last respect. Bartlett didn’t seem to understand the collector’s drive much better at the end of the book than at the beginning. I didn’t. The Man Who Loved Books too Much works as a story about interesting or unusual people.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in
The Private Investigator’s Handbook by Chuck Chambers

Be All You Can Be! by John C. Maxwell

Maxell, John C.  Be All You Can Be!  Colorado Springs, CO: Victor, 1987.

I’ve read several of John C. Maxwell’s books.  He has become almost an industry in himself for the production of leadership books.  It started while he was still a pastor.  Be All You Can Be! draws from leadership lessons he gave his staff at a church where he was pastor.

Maxwell sounds more like a pastor in this book than he does in some of his later works.  It is full of homiletical mnemonics.  As a kid, I thought these methods were mainly intended to help the hearers remember the message.  Nowadays, I think it is equally intended to help pastor remember their sermons.

It is probably best to take the book as a set of lessons.  Each chapter has a focused theme on some aspect of leadership.  These themes recur in Maxwell’s other books, and entire leadership books are built around any one of them.

The downside of the focused chapters is that it is difficult to find the thread that ties them together, other than leadership.  It might be that leadership is a costly endeavor.  The potential leader will face obstacles, resistance and distractions in abundance.  Much is demanded of a successful leader, and he will need a vision, character, and commitment to carry him through.

The upside of the book is that it covers a lot of ground in relatively few pages.  Each chapter can be read at convenient intervals without much concern over the order in which you read them.  If you looking for a basic leadership book, especially one that draws on a Christian or ministry context, this may be the one.

Having said that, I think it is worth a paragraph to discuss Maxwell in a wider context.  I’ve heard evangelicals lament that recently the books most read by pastors relate to leadership rather than their faith.  Many of those leadership books are probably Maxwell products.  Be All You Can Be! is more explicitly related to a church setting than his other books, but that isn’t an especially important matter.  Maxwell draw examples from the Bible, but he might have found adequate examples from other sources.  Even the selection of an author for the forward is telling.  Zig Ziglar is a prominent Christian, but millions have read his self-help and sales books without any concern, or possibly even knowledge, of his religion.  This book might be found in the Christian section of some bookstores, but it there is little that would keep it out of the business or self-help aisles.

John C. Maxwell also wrote

Developing the Leader Within
The Difference Maker
Winning with People

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership Tested by Time by James L. Garlow

On Becoming a Leader by Warren Bennis

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Write Naked by Jennifer Probst

Romance writer Jennifer Probst has written more than a score of published books. In Write Naked, she shares her experiences, both successes and mistakes, of building her career as a professional writer.

Probst was not an immediate success. She wrote six books before writing one that was published. One of the lessons of the book is that it takes persistence, time and effort to develop you skill and find a place for your work. Even after writing successful books, the book you’re working on can be a struggle; Probst confesses to finding challenges in writing her most recent books.

Success itself can be a challenge. When she finally made it, she made it big, with a large sale and a book that hit the bestseller lists. After that, the pressure was on. She felt the expectations of her editor and readers to produce another hit that they would love. The pressure to meet those expectations made the next book much harder. It was successful, but not as successful, which she found very disappointing. She points out the reality that you won’t hit a home run every time you step up to the plate, but a base hit is still a success.

I admit that I’m not a fan of romance. However, I am a bit in awe of the ability to many successful romance writers to produce. They turn out books and their books sell. This requires work—they have to get it done. Probst’s advice includes dealing with that aspect of writing. She treats it as her business. She writes every day. She sets goals. She creates deadlines (or gets them from her editor) and meets them. She sets aside time to promote her books and interact with readers. She also says no to things that don’t fit her life and career as a writer so her time and energy isn’t drained away from where it is needed.

Some might thing Probst’s revelation of her experience takes some of the romance out of writing. Of course, whether it is romantic or not, there are realities to making a career of writing. An aspiring writer will need to deal with it.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

Finding Your Writer’s Voice by Thaisa Frank & Dorothy Wall

Just Write by Walter Dean Myers

Mastering Fiction Writing by Kit Reed

No Plot? Not Problem! A Low Stress-High Velocity Guide to Writing a Novel in 30 Days by Chris Baty

The Right to Write by Julia Cameron

Shut Up & Write! by Judy Bridges

Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg

Probst, Jennifer. Write Naked: A Bestseller’s Guide to Writing Romance and Navigating the Path to Success. Cincinnati: Writer’s Digest Books, 2017.

STEM Books

I’ve reviewed 39 STEM-related books (and counting).  STEM is an acronym for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.  As you may have seen in the news, there is a push to improve STEM education, interest students in STEM fields, and grow the number of workers in these fields.  The idea is that these will be the skills needed by workers of the future.  If you’re a STEM educator or a student considering a career in STEM fields, you might like to take a look at some of these books.

I’ll confess that I’m not an educator, but I think most of these books will be accessible to high school and college students, and a few to middle school students.  The list is also a reflection of my career and interests in engineering, public health, policy, and history.  Even with these biases, I think it is a good list for someone looking for STEM-related books.

How to Build an Android: The True Story of Philip K. Dick’s Robotic Resurrection by David F. Dufty

I was fascinated by robots as a kid.  I enjoyed reading Isaac Asimov’s robot stories.  I longed for the Omnibot 2000 in the Sears Wishbook.

Robots have come a long way.  In How to Build an Android, David F. Dufty describes the short strange life of a very complex robot made to look and talk like science fiction author Philip K. Dick.  The robot had a very sophisticated and lifelike head and complex artificial intelligence.  As with most complex things, it was the work of many people who had to solve a lot of problems.

If you’re interested in robotics, this is an interesting nontechnical book.  In addition, you’ll get introduced to some freaky sci-fi.  You may even get as (somewhat) legitimate reason to use the word “Dickhead” (capitalized, it refers to a fan of PKD, so don’t go using it on anyone).

The Big Roads: The Untold Story of the Engineers, Visionaries, and Trailblazers Who Created the American Superhighways by Earl Swift

The Interstate highway system in the United States is one of the most enormous structures built.  Some of the prospective STEM students who read this may actually be younger than the Intestate system, though in some sense it is never complete because it needs constant repair and maintenance.  The Interstates were completed in the 1990s, but the Federal-Aid Highways go back to 1916.

Earl Swift wrote an accessible history of the Interstates in The Big Roads.  If you interested in automobiles or transportation, it’s a good read.

Dreams of Iron and Steel by Deborah Cadbury

Deborah Cadbury describes seven wonders of engineering in Dreams of Iron and Steel.  It covers almost a century of history, but many of the events are concentrated in the Victorian Era.  That was a time of great technological innovation.

Though the book is history, many of the structures still stand.  Railways, the Brooklyn Bridge, the Suez and Panama Canals, and Hoover Dam stand testament to an age of big engineering.

The Physics of Superheroes by James Kakalios

Though the memory of Professor Wragg’s sneer prompts me to not make this confession, part of my interest in science and technology came from comic books.  Iron Man was cool.  Spider-Man’s web shooters were very cool.  Superhero comics are full of fantasy, admittedly, but the strange, unrealistic science and technology they depict have inspired many to study STEM in reality.

Physicist John Kakalios uses examples from comic books to explore real physics in The Physics of Supeheroes.  Sometimes comics get there science right.  Even when they get it wrong, it can be instructive.  If you know what people are talking about when they refer to the “New 52,” you may find this book to be a great introduction to physics.

1089 and All That: A Journey into Mathematics by David Acheson

Here is another confession: I’m not especially interested in math.  I endured a lot of math classes to study engineering.  Reading David Acheson’s 1089 and All That did not require such endurance.  For one reason, it is a short book.  For another, Acheson doesn’t expect his readers to be mathematicians; it is enough to follow the outline of the math he discusses.

I recommend this book because so many people have a fear of math.  1089 can be followed by many high school students and older folks with math phobias.  Just take a deep breath, relax, and follow along as well as you can.  You’ll see that math can be interesting, useful, and even beautiful in a way.

The Brooklyn Bridge: They Said it Couldn’t be Built by Judith St. George

Judith St. George’s The Brooklyn Bridge is a short history of and iconic bridge.  Written for the bridge’s 100^th anniversary, it is also the story of the engineers who sacrificed life and health to see it completed: John Roebling and his son Washington.  John Roebling was a German immigrant who built many suspension bridges and owed a wire-making business.  He gave his son and extraordinary education in bridge engineering for the time, and before beginning work on the Brooklyn Bridge he served as an officer in the Union Army during the Civil War.

Why should a cutting-edge STEM student read about a bridge that is almost 130 years old?  It’s because we still use and rely on very successful, centuries old technologies.  Improving and rebuilding our infrastructure will be an important part of our economy.  As recently as 2010, New York City and the federal government committed $500 million to repair and repaint the Brooklyn Bridge.

The Essential Engineer: Why Science Alone Will Not Solve Our Global Problems by Henry Petroski

STEM lumps together science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.  Is there a difference between science and engineering?  Is it important?

Henry Petroski, a professor of civil engineering and history and author of The Essential Engineer, believes there is an important difference.  At heart, science is about increasing knowledge.  Engineering is about invention.  Of course, new knowledge makes new invention possible.  Just as often, though, engineering runs ahead of science.  Sometimes science didn’t advance until someone invented the instruments to conduct new observations and experiments.  The invention of the microscope made possible the science of microbiology.  Steam engines were built and greatly improved before we had a modern scientific understanding of thermodynamics.  In fact, thermodynamics was to a large extent born out of desire to understand steam engines. In this sense, it is an engineering science (study of manmade things) as much as a natural science (study of natural things) or branch of physics.

Petroski’s focus in the book is the importance of engineering to policymaking, where it is often overshadowed by science.  Policy, science, and engineering play off of each other a lot.  Most of my career as an engineer has been related to government, policy, and regulatory compliance.

The Ghost Map: The Story of London’s Most Terrifying Epidemic—and How It Changed Science, Cities, and the Modern World by Steven Johnson

The Ghost Map by science writer Steven Johnson is the story of the birth of epidemiology.  Epidemiology is a medical science that uses statistics to help us understand how diseases operate in a population.  Using various statistical and geographic tools, long before we had computers and GIS, physician John Snow demonstrated that cholera, once a recurring plague that wiped out hundreds of thousands of people in some outbreaks, was a waterborne disease.  This understanding, initially met with much skepticism, allowed officials to intervene to prevent the spread of the disease.  For those who say of their math classes, “I’ll never us this,” here is a case where math (and science and policy) were used to make a great difference.

Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West by Stephen Ambrose

It is not much publicized today that the Lewis and Clark expedition of 1804 to 1806 had a partly scientific mission.  Captains Lewis and Clark were charges with bringing back samples of the flora, fauna, and culture of the western territories.  It was also hoped that they would find a water passage to the Pacific Ocean.  In Undaunted Courage, Stephen Ambrose writes about the scientific mission as well as the policy, diplomacy, and commercial hopes the expedition carried.

Of course, what attracts most people to the Lewis and Clark expedition is that it was a great adventure.  There is a place in STEM fields for thoughtful adventurers and explorers. 

Buried Alive: The Terrifying History of Our Most Primal Fear by Jan Bondeson

A list like this deserves something strange, creepy, and more fun than you care to admit.  Right now, thousands of very young future STEM workers are catching bugs and snakes, breaking their toys to see what is inside, or staring into space with a weird expression of vacancy and concentration.

Jan Bondeson’s Buried Alive is not a morbid book.  It is sometimes humorous, especially in consideration of topic.  From a STEM point of view, Bondeson shows how knowledge accumulates over time.  The fears and activities of our forefathers may seem strange to us, but they sometimes made sense in light of what they knew.  Buried Alive doesn’t simply play off our fascination with the grotesque and death, though the book might not have been written if we lacked that fascination, I think it reminds us to approach our ancestors with a touch of grace and humility.  Maybe our progeny will show us the same courtesy.

If you’re looking for something for a younger student, check out this post→ from Joanne Loves Science or these recommendations→ from STEM Friday.  By the way, I also write about engineering, infrastructure and the environment at Infrastructure Watch.

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The Pentateuch

The first five books of the Bible are collectively referred to as the Pentateuch, from the Greek for “five books.” In the Hebrew Bible, they are referred to as the Torah, from the Hebrew for “law.”

The Pentateuch is partly a book of laws. In the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy can be found the civil and ecclesiastical law given for the Israelite theocracy would be established in the Promised Land. Moral law also appears in these books, most famously in the Ten Commandments.



Some would say that “law” is too narrow an interpretation of “torah.” A better word might be “teachings” or “doctrine.” The contents of these books were meant to be taught and contain repeated instructions to remember and to teach the works of God to successive generations. Stories from these books have been told and retold for centuries.

These books contain more than law. They are history as well. In particular, they are a history of God’s interaction with creation and especially mankind. Genesis begins with creation and ends with Joseph, a key figure in history of the Israelites and, in some ways, a type of Christ. Abraham and his descendents are the main thread of Genesis in which we see God working to rebuild a relationship with sinful humanity. The remaining books with the Israelites eventual enslavement in Egypt to border of the Promise Land. The prophet Moses is the main figure of these books as God’s spokesman.

It can be easy to get lost in the details of these books. They are not as riddled with genealogies and “begats” as some suggest. Even so, sometimes there is a surprising amount of detail. The style in some sections can seem stilted to modern readers. Familiarity with Jewish traditions can bring some life into the sometimes dry descriptions of ceremonies.

Don’t let yourself be too bogged down by the details. Remember that they are important. As a believer, they are important because they are part of the inspired Word of Gods. As a reader seeking to understand these books, they are important because they were important to the people who wrote, copied, and even memorized these books for generations.

In addition, they are part of a larger story. It’s a good story, too. It is the story of the establishment of a people, and from those people a nation. All of this is part of a larger story of redemption: God working through history to rescue, redeem, and restore people who were enslaved to sin and sentenced to death for their wrongdoings. It is an exciting story and the Pentateuch contains important early chapters that help us understand the rest what comes later.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in
Deuteronomy
Exodus
Genesis
The Holy Bible
King James Bible
Leviticus
Numbers

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Reading Like a Writer by the Aptly Named Francine Prose

Prose, Francine.  Reading Like a Writer: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them.  New York: HarperCollins, 2006.

Reading Like a Writer is different than the other books about reading that I’ve read so far.  Francine Prose doesn’t discuss judging what you read, but learning from it.  She wants readers, like herself and the aspiring writers she teaches, to look at how great writers accomplish what they do.  In that sense it is as much a book about writing as it is about literary criticism.

The book is organized with writing in mind.  Prose covers topics that are of interest to writers of fiction: words, sentences, paragraphs, narrative, character, dialogue, details and gesture.  In each chapter she discusses these issues using examples from works of classic literature.  I confess that I’ve read very few of the books she references, but she provides enough of a quotation or explanation that you don’t need to have read the book to follow her illustrations.  You don’t need to have a degree in literature to follow; this book might serve as an introduction to some classic literature.

The method Prose proposes is close reading.  This is slow, attentive reading.  It can be very purposeful, such as seeking out every time an author uses a particular word or concept.  Of course, to read with such a particular purpose in mind suggest you or someone else has already done a close reading with a more general purpose of paying attention and noticing how the book affects you and how the author accomplishes those effects.

Close reading is not intended to be a dry and analytical.  Books can be enjoyable, moving and fun.  If a fiction book doesn’t have some emotional impact on you, even if simply the pleasure of entertainment, then why would you bother to read it?  Close reading includes taking in the beauty of a story and the words used to express it.  You may not want to approach every book this way, but great books are worth the time and effort.

This book might be interesting to the critic or reviewer, professional or amateur.  I think it will be more interesting to aspiring writers who want to learn from the masters.  Prose has several masters to recommend and an approach to setting at their feet as they teach.  She won’t tell you how to write.  As much as there may be rules to writing there are examples of great writers who have bent or broken them. Reading Like a Writer may help you discover how writers did it well and hopefully you’ll continue that course on your own.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster

How to Talk About Books You Haven’t Read by Pierre Bayard

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Power in Praise by Merlin R. Carothers

Carothers, Merlin R. Power in Praise. Escondido, CA: Merlin R. Carothers, 1972.

I bought a copy of Power in Praise by Merlin R. Carothers at a library book sale. It sat on my shelf for months. I have more appetite for books than time. I was surprised to find it listed in bibliography of Melody Beattie’s last self-help book, Make Miracles in Forty Days. Because reviewing books is inherently about comparing and contrasting books, I made reading Power in Praise a priority.

At a very basic level, Beattie and Carothers have a similar message. Be grateful for everything. Carothers would say praise God in everything.

Our thanks and praise, especially for those things we for which we don’t necessarily feel grateful, brings about in us a peace, contentment, and new perspective on our situation. It often leads to a change in our circumstances, too.

The two authors differ on their view of how this works. For Beattie, it is a universal law. It works because that is the nature of the universe. You can blend it with whatever religion you like or none. Expressing thanks for the hard things will change your life regardless of your religion.

Carothers, in contrast, sees God as the author of our lives. He is in control of all. The hardships, pain, setbacks, and everything else in our life is under His control.

We can praise God even in the worst situations because we trust Him. God loves us and had a good plan for our life. If He permits difficulties, it is because it will produce good. First is the good of coming to God and acknowledging Jesus Christ as our savior. After that comes the producing of a godly character and preparation for work that shows God’s power, love and grace.



Power in Praise is, in part, a book of stories about people who have put Carothers’ principle to the test. Some of these come from the Bible, especially from Paul, who suffered all manner of calamities, but remained contented, peaceful, and even joyful, because He trusted God in all things. Many of the cases come form his experience as an Army chaplain.

As you might expect, people were reluctant to praise God for disease, accidents, failures and other troubles. Some were willing to try even if they didn’t feel it; Carothers writes that it is a matter of faith and not feeling or understanding. Those that tried discovered a transformation in themselves. For Carothers, this is the main thing. To know God and be closer to Him, trusting Him more, is the best thing. In many cases, these people saw quick changes in their circumstances, too.

Carothers also deals with the flipside of praise and thanksgiving with a chapter on grumbling and complaining. He says that to complain is to make accusations against God. It is an expression of distrust. Arguably, mankind’s fall into sin came from distrusting God and it has caused us a lot of trouble sense. The better stand, the position of power, is to trust God in everything, believing that He has a good plan even when bad things happen.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in
365 Thank Yous by John Kralik
Gratitude by Melody Beattie
Into the Depths of God by Calvin Miller
Make Miracles in Forty Days by Melody Beattie
Thanks! by Robert A. Emmons

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Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer

Have you ever wondered about those people who can remember names, phone numbers, birthdays and odd facts with ease? Some people have prodigious memories. How do they do it?

Joshua Foer began to ask these questions when he covered the 2005 U.S. Memory Championship for Slate. Within a few minutes, the mental athletes at this event could memorize a poem, a deck of cards or a thousand random numbers. A year later, he returned to that event as a competitor, and he won. Walking with Einstein is Foer’s recounting of his year of training in memory techniques and his exploration of the meaning of memory.

This book is not a manual on memory techniques, though Foer briefly describes them. You can find them described in more detail elsewhere. Many of the techniques are ancient, or elaborations on ancient techniques. The discovery of the primary technique is attributed to Simonides, a Greek poet who lived about 500 years before Christ. After the collapse of a banquet hall, which he narrowly escaped because he stepped out to greet a messenger, he discovered he could picture in his mind where every guest had been seated, and was able to identify the location of the bodies. Later authors built upon this idea of a “memory palace,” and it was widely used before the invention of printing.

The basic idea is simple. We have amazing capacities to remember locations and images, so just tie things we want to remember to an image and place. First, pay attention to what you want to remember (it may only take a second). Next, form a memorable image that will remind you of the thing you want to remember. The more outrageous the image is the better it will work. Serious mnemonists develop systems of images. Finally, “place” those images in a memory palace, preferably some real place you know very well. It turns out that the main thing may be the attentiveness all of this technique requires and the multiple paths to remembering you create.

Like Foer, I was disappointed that feats mental athletes perform are not things I want to do. I’d like to be better at remembering names, but all I may need to do to improve is pay attention. I’d like to be able to remember passages of text, but this is very difficult even using mnemonics.

The more interesting thing in the book turns out to be Foer’s exploration of the place of memory in our history and culture. In an age before books, and especially before indexed books, it was very difficult to store information anywhere outside of memory. Even if you read something on a scroll, it would not be easy to find it again. If you wanted quick access to something, you needed to memorize it. People would intensely study the few texts they had and got to know them very well, possibly memorizing them entirely.

Books made accessing information much easier and therefore remembering less important. The Internet has made tons of information accessible in an instant. We have shifted away from valuing intensive study to valuing extensive study, or being widely read. We don’t know as deeply, but we know how to access information for a variety of places.

Memory is not a valueless art in our age. Memorizing techniques engage the imagination to create memorable images. In reverse, our memories are the feedstock of our imaginations. Our creativity, innovation, and invention draws upon the things we remember and the many connections we form between memories. For a creative mind to invent, it needs to be stocked with useful memories.

Similarly, memory has value in defining ourselves. Who we are as an individual is largely defined by our habits and memories. In a sense, the more we remember, the fuller are our lives. Shared memories are part of how we relate to others, and shared knowledge is important to culture.

I started reading this book with an interest in improving memory. My takeaway ends up being that I want to be more attentive to life. I want to form the most vivid memories I can of the people and events that are important to me.

If you’re interested in this book, you may also be interested in

The Genius in All of Us by David Shenk

How to Talk About Books You Haven’t Read by Pierre Bayard

Idea Mapping by Jamie Nast

Your Intelligence Makeover by Edward F. Droge, Jr.

If you want to improve you memory, you may also be interested in a fish oil supplement.

Foer, Joshua. Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything. New York: Penguin, 2011.

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