Artemis - Andy Weir

A lunar story from the author of the Martian, great premise and a great read. This author goes to great lengths to get the science and physics as accurate as possible and thats what I loved about the Martian, so I heard about this new book I just had to pick it up.





Artemis is a great Heist story based on the first Lunar colony on the moon. That by itself is interesting enough but the story is narrated by a young delinquent female with a sassy attitude that gives the readers a great lowdown of what it would be like to live on the moon. For eg: due to the low gravity, their staircases have steps that are one meter high but they still use the regular type steps for the tourist zones to provide some kind of comfort. And lots of factual tidbids that would actually make sense if we were to colonize the moon.

This was a page turner for me and i'd highly recommend this to someone who's looking for a really fun read and open to understanding the social, political and physical realities of colonizing the moon in about 200 years.

Rendezvous with Rama - Arthur C Clark

I picked up this book on a Sc-Fi recommendation and with the success of 2001 Space Odyssey, it seemed like a good bet. The author touches on the topic of First contact with the human race, which isn't a new concept but the writing style is where this one takes the cake.



 I expected this to be a predictable first contact story with some twists and turns but its not. Theres a great amount of detail around a cylindrical object thats approaching the solar system thats soon determined to be artificial. Then the author takes you on a ride through the investigation in great detail and true laws of physics in place that make you rethink your own world and assumptions.

I loved reading this book and it does tend to get slow at times due to the exorbitant amount of details but still a fun read.

Unleashing the Innovators - Jim Stengel

I picked up this book because I saw some parallels with my professional life and I thought it might help and it does. The author dives into the topic of high large corporations can get in their own way by adding red tape and still be able to move at the pace of a small startup.


Its no secret that large corporations have policies and bureaucracies to protect themselves and perform better but something gets lost in terms of innovation due to the time it takes to react. Conversely a 5 people startup company can pivot into a new market, process, product in a fraction of the time that a large corporation can.  This book dives into the concept of marrying the two. This isn't a new concept and a lot of corporations leverage innovation by forming innovation hubs and acquiring startups but mostly this book focuses on partnerships.

A lot of recommendations and pitfalls regarding forming good partnerships was helpful to me to understand, and its written in plain English with plenty of real world examples from tech companies that you might recognize, not to mention that also keeps it very interesting. I'd recommend this to anyone in the corporate world working in partnerships to get guidance on ideas and pitfalls, no matter the size of your org.

Go Like Hell - A.J.Baime

This is one of those pieces of non fiction that feels like a story, and it really is. The author has taken just the right amount of quotes and details from real events to stick together this story of the war between Ford and Ferrari.

The war between these auto giants stems from the wake of WW2 and roots that are planted well before WW1. True stories of how two completely different corporate cultures from two sides of the Atlantic, throw everything at their disposal into one race for the sake of glory.

This book also helps highlight how auto races equate into real dollars for manufacturers. The individual stories of the development of each Ford and Ferrari like they are real people also adds a lot of character. I'd highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to understand the roots of auto racing and the larger-than-life moguls (Henry Ford II & Enzo Ferrari) that lit a spark to a flame that burned for generations.

Powerful - Patty McCord

This book is written by an ex COO of Netflix. That by itself was interesting enough to hear about the internal workings of one of the cornerstone Tech companies of my generation.

Once we get into the meat of it, Patty is a great story teller and gets her message across very clearly. No wonder she does so many speaking events. She also draws a lot of parallels to her experience at Netflix with real stories and that's also very interesting.

At the end of the day this is a management book with a focus on HR and I'd recommend this to anyone in a management position because you'll surely walk away with some real world ideas to explore in a really really quick read.

Atlas shrugged - Ayn Rand

This Book is told by many to be the best work of fiction in our generation and it starts off great. Ayn Rand is of Russian descent and writes about the benefits of capitalism in this highly sensationalized piece of fiction with amazing wordplay, metaphors and writing style. 

There's just enough suspense in the beginning to hold my interest but after that, it just gets into a spiral of long rants that are drilling in the same point again and again, with seemed like really bad transitions.

This book is unnecessarily long and could have been written in less than half the length, no joke, there's a speech that's 50 pages long. At the end this book seems more of a propaganda piece wrapped around with an over-the-top story that seems to put out the idea of a populist Apocalypse where capitalists are heroes.

Life of Tao - Wesley Chu

A new kind of extra terrestrial story, a Sci-Fi with humor and a twist. Not the normal alien visitor story. Even had the right amount of story development mixed in but not too much depth, which makes this a quick release read.

Seems like they've definitely left it open for the sequel as well. So I'm going to hold on to my recommendations on this one until I've gotten through the sequel but so far the story is entertaining.

Alchemist - Paulo Coelho

I've had several people tell me about this book and when I'm glad I finally picked it up.  This book makes you want to rethink life. It makes you rethink concepts, rethink perspectives and rethink context.

Like the occasional cosmic relevance you need to gain perspective, this book doesn't fail to deliver.  Centered around the story of a Shepard boy and yet able to relate with almost anyone in any walk of life. Highly recommend this philosophical read that isn't intimidating, only humiliating.

Harry Potter & the Deathly Hallows

The final book is exactly what you'd expect from the Rowling series and a classic ending that youd expect but the journey is great. This book is darkest of the series and has the most enticing plot of the series that keeps you engaged all the way to the end.

Highly recommend this to anyone especially if you've read the rest of the series, since this one ties a neat bow to the story of Harry Potter.

The circle - Dave Eggers

I like to think that this book is a commentary, even a satire, but I fear that will be giving it too much attention.

Due to the involved nature of the subject, social media and the extrapolated affects it may have on our society, this book touches on topics that could be considered by anyone today as a possible future. But the sensationalism so far stretched, that this piece of fiction isn't entertaining. The characters are developed but they're exactly what you'd expect and the the storyline goes places you wouldn't expect, I suspect to keep it interesting, and its completely disconnected.

I would not recommend this book to anyone really even though Tom Hanks was cast in the movie, and that's saying a lot.