Two excellent books

My family and friends, as well as my mommy when I was little, sometimes ask "How can you read so much?"  Truth is, I talk more and think more than I read.  But I do read some.  It is a good way for me to get my mind engaged.  I like information or fiction that surprises me and at the same time, tickles me or pleases me or makes me feel that I understand me and the world more fully.

I am listening to "The Blue Sweater" by Jacqueline Novogratz in my car.  It is a very surprising work.  The full title is "The Blue Sweater: Bridging the Gap Between Rich and Poor in an Interconnected World."  It is an attempt to understand how poverty in poor countries works and how aid often doesn't.  The book deals with the financial and social problems of poor women worldwide while telling the author's true story of her Virginia upbringing, her education, and her work and adventures in banking, financial analysis, philanthropy and being a young and very adventurous woman in South America, Africa and India.  

I have a burdensome habit of urging my wife and friends (see?  I am doing it right now!) to read books I like.  The Blue Sweater is a good one to listen to since you hear the author's voice and her expression and personality.

My nephew has a degree in library science and is an information architect, someone who tries to fashion useful and attractive arrangements of an organization's information, archives, communications and especially online pages.  He is a smarty and someone I like to follow.  A few years ago, he recommended "Everything is Miscellaneous" by David Weinburger.  That was a very good and informative book.  It and the book I am recommending here, just out, "Too Big to Know" by the same author do one of my favorite things for a book to do: help me to feel less worried about the world and my place in it.

"Too Big to Know" is about the crisis in knowledge.  What crisis?  Thanks for asking!  Here is a tip of the edge of what he is talking about.  (Actually, as Jackie Novogratz above also finds over and over, if someone has something valuable to say, the first taste of the message may well be disconcerting.  However, the reverse is not true. Would-be successes often feel they are on the right track just because they are disconcerting.  Nah, doesn't work.)

On to Weinburger's tip: World soccer is the most widespread, supported sport in the world by some measures.  The rules currently in place for the game do not allow the referees and judges to view instant replays, not like American football where the chief ref stands with his head in a hood to watch and re-watch exactly what happened when the intended receiver tried to snag a pass while in a crowd of nasty, oppositional opponents.  However, the fans, especially those in front of a tv, do get to watch the replays.  So, we have fans more in the know than the refs.  Hmm.. Is this what we want?

That is just a tip of an edge.  Weinburger gets right into the effect of the worldwide web on our idea and use of knowledge and he is terrific.  Put him on your reading dance card in the earliest open position and prepare for a good time.

Bill
Main blog: Fear, Fun and Filoz
Main web site: Kirbyvariety