Other books that might interest you

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  Anatomy of Greed - The...

  Brian Cruver

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  Brian Cruver first entered the "Death Star," Enron's office complex, in March 2001. He was twenty-nine years old, an eager MBA ready to cash in as a new hire with one of America's most highly valued companies. But, from his first day-when his new boss warned him, "there was a mix-up in the hiring process," but that it was "no big deal...just think of it like you're adopted"-to his last, when he and his colleagues were given thirty minutes to leave the building, Cruver found himself enmeshed in a business cult that each day grew only more bizarre. 
   
  With dark humor and page-turning momentum, Cruver lays out firsthand: the giddy group-think nurtured by Enron's leadership, whose incessant cheerleading for the company's stock price rendered many Enronians unable to believe that they were routinely being spoon-fed lies; the "rank and yank" peer review process that fostered horse-trading among managers over which employees would be given poor evaluations; the traders who made dubious deals to ensure their own lucrative bonuses; and the sinister designs and funding of Enron's fraudulent off-the-books partnerships. As Cruver probes the sleazy escapades that Enron executives milked for personal gain, he introduces us, up close and personal, to such storied figures as Ken Lay, Jeff Skilling, and Andy Fastow, along with other important Enron personalities like Rebecca Mark; Lou Pai; Thomas White, George W. Bush's Secretary of the Army; Joe Sutton; the "Mr. Blue," a disillusioned Enron executive; and Cruver's trading floor neighbor, a machine he christened "Sherman the Shredder"-who was always working overtime. 
   
  Cruver's day-by-day chronicle, which includes a running stock ticker to show the trajectory of Enron's collapse, is instantly reminiscent of such bestsellers as Liar's Poker and Barbarians at the Gate. Told in a fresh, empathetic voice, Anatomy of Greed is brimming with grist for political pundits and comic relief for victims of corporate collateral damage. It is also the personal story of a young executive, a Houston native, whose dream job and dream company crashed around him in an avalanche of lies and greed. From the wreckage, this newly hardened veteran of the corporate wars has written a cautionary tale that our leaders must heed-or imperil us all to future disasters.

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  The Worst Journey in the World...

  Apsley Cherry-Garrard

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  The Worst Journey in the World is a memoir of the 1910–1913 British Antarctic Expedition led by Robert Falcon Scott. It was written and published in 1922 by a survivor of the expedition, Apsley Cherry-Garrard, and has earned wide praise for its frank treatment of the difficulties of the expedition, the causes of its disastrous outcome, and the meaning (if any) of human suffering under extreme conditions. (Summary by Wikipedia)

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  Pacifist - Or My War and Louis...

  Donald Wetzel

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  “When I went to prison he disowned me. There will always be wars, he said. No there won’t, I said. Shit no, I said, are you crazy? That was roughly forty years ago. It was apparent to me then that war must soon become totally unthinkable. It happened even quicker than I’d thought it would. And so now we most of us do the best we can never to think of it, even though, as I write, about one-fourth of the world’s best technological and scientific minds are employed full time in preparing for this unthinkable war. . . .”

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  Alexander Hamilton

  Charles A. Conant

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  Alexander Hamilton was a significant figure in the political and economic development of the early United States. He served in the American Revolutionary War and became an aide to General George Washington. He was one of the authors (along with John Jay and James Madison) of a series of essays know as The Federalist Papers, which were written in support of the ratification of the proposed Constitution. Scholars and others still refer to these essays to this day for interpretation of the Constitution. As the first Secretary of the Treasury in George Washington’s Cabinet, Hamilton was a proponent of a strong centralized government. Hamilton pursued many actions (some controversial) in an attempt to provide financial stability for the new government, including the establishment of the U.S. Mint and a National Bank. Ironically, he may most often be remembered for the infamous pistol duel with Aaron Burr that resulted in Hamilton’s death. (Summary by lubee930)

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  My Mother a Serial Killer

  Hazel Baron, Janet Fife-Yeomans

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  A gripping and shocking story of a serial killer mother, and the brave daughter who brought her to justice. 
    
  Dulcie Bodsworth was the unlikeliest serial killer. She was loved everywhere she went, and the townsfolk of Wilcannia, which she called home in the late 1950s, thought of her as kind 
  and caring. The officers at the local police station found Dulcie witty and charming, and looked forward to the scones and cakes she generously baked and delivered for their morning tea. 
  That was one side of her. Only her daughter Hazel saw the real Dulcie. And what she saw terrified her. 
  Dulcie was in fact a cold, calculating killer who, by 1958, had put three men in their graves - one of them the father of her four children, Ted Baron - in one of the most infamous periods of the state's history. She would have got away with it all had it not been for Hazel. 
  Written by award-winning journalist Janet Fife-Yeomans together with Hazel Baron, My Mother, A Serial Killer is both an evocative insight into the harshness of life on the fringes of Australian society in the 1950s, and a chilling story of a murderous mother and the courageous daughter who testified against her and put her in jail.

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  Against Medical Advice

  James Patterson, Hal Friedman

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  Cory Friedman woke up one morning when he was five years old with the uncontrollable urge to shake his head and his life was never the same again.  From that day forward his life became a hell of uncontrollable tics, urges, and involuntary utterances. Eventually he is diagnosed with Tourette's Syndrome and Obsessive Compulsive disorder, and Cory embarks on an excruciating journey from specialist to specialist, enduring countless combinations of medications in wildly varying doses.  Soon it becomes unclear what tics are symptoms of his disease and what are side effects of the drugs. The only certainty is that it kept getting worse. Despite his lack of control, Cory is aware of every embarrassing movement, and sensitive to every person's reaction to his often aggravating presence.  Simply put: Cory Friedman's life is a living hell. AGAINST MEDICAL ADVICE is the true story of Cory and his family's decades-long battle for survival in the face of extraordinary difficulties and a maddening medical establishment. It is a heart-rending story of struggle and triumph with a climax as dramatic as any James Patterson thriller.

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