Tag: books
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Review: Simon’s Homocide
Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets David Simon You’ve read this right? You have to. The best book on cops ever and its written by the creator of the world’s greatest TV show, the Wire. Baltimore in the early nineties was a violent place, policed by a largely white and often racist police force…
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Review: Zimler’s The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon
The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon Richard Zimler Murder mystery set among the Jewish community of Lisbon at the time they were being forced into exile. Good for the pop history of the Jews of Lisbon, but sub-par as a murder mystery. The scene of a community being torn apart and murdered because of antisemitism is…
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Review: Taleb’s Black Swan
The Black Swan: Second Edition: The Impact of the Highly Improbable: With a new section: “On Robustness and Fragility” (Incerto) Nassim Nicolas Taleb The book every trader/i-banker/finance nerd had to read. The thesis of this is pretty much the same as Taleb’s earlier work – we discount the chances and effects of the random or…
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Review: Pelecanos’s Right as Rain
Right As Rain: A Derek Strange Novel (Derek Strange Novels) George Pelecanos Pelecanos is the great chronicler of our nation’s capital (Washington, D.C.) as it is lived by its actual citizens. For a crime writer who works in place and character, he is top of his game. This is the first of Pelecanos’s series chronicling…
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Review: Littell’s The Company
The Company: A Novel of the CIA Robert Littell A better than average page-turner spy novel tracing the history of the agency through the stories of a group of men who come into it as it was being formed and end up in the upper reaches of the organization. Clearly based on real guys, some…
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Review: Baer’s See No Evil
See No Evil: The True Story of a Ground Soldier in the CIA’s War on Terrorism Robert Baer Did you see Syriana? Well, Clooney’s character is allegedly based on Baer. If that’s true, it doesn’t seem to be a very accurate portrayal. What I got out of this book was not the story of a…
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Review: Collier’s Bottom Billion
The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries are Failing and What Can Be Done About It Paul Collier Here is the basic argument – while it sucks to be poor in countries like India, India is heading for relative prosperity, and therefore some hope for its poorest citizens. Where is really, really sucks to be…
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Review: Feinberg’s Stone Butch Blues
Stone Butch Blues: A Novel Leslie Feinberg This novel/memoir chronicles the world of a working class lesbian, gay, and transgendered people in New York from the days before Stonewall to the early nineties. It is a classic and was at the time it came out the most important book written to date on transgender issues.…
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Review: Defoe’s Moll Flanders
Moll Flanders: The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders (Penguin Classics) Daniel Defoe Moll Flanders is a bleak read. Everyone is pretty fucking awful. Moll herself can be read in numerous ways. She is a conniving, evil, women, brought low by her sins (this is arguably the way Defoe meant to portray her).…
Milo and the Calf 