Since the end of February, I've read:
*
Diary of a Very Bad Year: Confessions of an Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager. Very, very interesting and lucid account of the financial crisis.
*Thomas Sowell,
Economic Facts and Fallacies. If you like Sowell, you'll love this book. If you don't like him, you'll hate it. No real surprises.
*Steve Coll,
Private Empire: ExxonMobil and American Power. I don't know why this has gotten so much attention. I mean, it's not like XOM is the only company lobbying or trying to make money for shareholders. To the extent you're shocked that a company acts in its own interests and doesn't attempt to serve as an arm of the American state, this is worthwhile. But I didn't find it to be all that revealing or surprising.
*Samuel Becket,
Waiting for Godot. A quick, light classic.
*John Stott,
Basic Christianity. Reminds me of Lewis' Mere Christianity, but not as good.
*Barry Unsworth,
Sacred Hunger. Generally well-written and decent plot, but trying too hard to drive home a political point. It's one way to win the Booker Prize, but not a phenomenal book.
*Friedrich Von Hayek,
The Road to Serfdom. Absolutely worth reading.
*Cormac McCarty,
No Country for Old Men. I haven't seen the movie, but the book was gripping.
*Lynne Truss,
Eats, Shoots, & Leaves. You can pound this out in a couple of hours. If you're a grammar nerd, it's amusing. If you're not, stay away.
*Michael Gordon,
The End Game: The Inside Story of the Struggle for Iraq. I found this to be a great look into what was going on in Iraq, and it's helpful to get a big perspective on major issues. I follow foreign affairs pretty well, but much of this was new to me.
*Stephen King,
11/22/63. Typical King: great writing; fantastic (in both senses of the word) plot; not great literature but worth the 900-page slog.
I'm currently reading Faulkner's
The Sound and the Fury and David Mitchell's
Cloud Atlas​.
