by Lindsay Shapka in Book List, Culture, History
Words ignite ideas, and they breathe life into the world.
Those same words come together, and with a stroke of a pen, they bring people books. Books have a lasting impact because they spread remarkable thoughts like wildfire. People read them, and their impact is spread all over the globe.
Read Moreby Lindsay Shapka in Book List, Culture, People
I knew that I HAD to read this book by Louann Brizendine, M.D. (a neuropsychiatrist at the University of California) when I saw an interview with Whitney Cummings on Live With Kelly & Ryan (confession: I watch that sometimes), where she talked about how this book blew her mind and inspired her to co-write and direct a movie by the same name.
Read Moreby Lindsay Shapka in Book List, Culture, People, Travel
North Korea is a fascinating country because there is so little that we know about it. Most of the information that we have is either propaganda fed to us from the country itself or hearsay from people who have heard stories from someone who has heard a story.
Read Moreby Lindsay Shapka in Book List, Culture, People, Travel
This novel by Swedish writer Lena Andersson is a whirlwind of intense and all-to-real emotions. Though I am not usually a fan of novels, this book — translated from Swedish — jumped out at me (literally, it fell off the bookshelf as I walked by) when I walked into a bookstore while travelling in Sweden this past summer.
Read Moreby Lindsay Shapka in Book List, People, Culture
If the title of this book — The Life-Changing Magic of Not Giving a F#ck — sounds vaguely familiar, that's because it is a hilarious parody of the bestselling The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up.
The concept of this book is to teach you "how to stop spending time you don't have with people you don't like doing things you don't want to do" aka STOP PEOPLE PLEASING!!
Read Moreby Lindsay Shapka in Book List, Culture, History
Based on the number of books printed and sold in the last 50 years, this is the list of the top ten most read (English) books — along with their opening line — on our planet.
How many have you read? (No, watching the movie doesn't count!)
THE HOLY BIBLE
"In the Beginning God Created the Heavens and the Earth."
QUOTATIONS FROM CHAIRMAN MAO TSE-TUNG by Mao Tse-Tung
"The force at the core leading our cause forward is the Chinese Communist Party."
HARRY POTTER by J.K. Rowling
"Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much."
THE LORD OF THE RINGS by J.R.R. Tolkien
"When Mr Bilbo Baggins of Bag End announced that he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first birthday with a party of special magni- ficence, there was much talk and excitement in Hobbiton."
THE ALCHEMIST by Paulo Coelho
"The Alchemist picked up a book that someone in the caravan had brought."
THE DA VINCI CODE by Dan Brown
"Renowned curator Jacques Sauniere staggered through the vaulted archway of the museum's Grand Gallery."
THE TWILIGHT SAGA by Stephanie Meyer
"I'd never given much thought to how I would die — though I'd had reason enough in the last few months — but even if I had, I would not have imagined it like this."
GONE WITH THE WIND by Margaret Mitchell
"Scarlett O'Hara was not beautiful, but men seldom realized it when caught by her charm as the Tarleton twins were."
THINK AND GROW RICH by Napoleon Hill
"TRULY, "thoughts are things," and powerful things at that, when they are mixed with definiteness of purpose, persistence, and a BURNING DESIRE for their translation into riches, or other material objects"
THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK by Anne Frank
“I hope to tell you everything that I could never tell anyone until now.”
by Lindsay Shapka in Book List, People, Culture
Hoping to write a compelling thesis on urban poverty, first-year graduate student Sudhir Venkatesh walked boldly into the middle of Chicago’s most notorious housing projects one afternoon determined to gain some insight.
His boldness — meant to impress his professors — instead impressed a gang leader named JT who, attracted to the idea of being written about, befriended Venkatesh giving him unprecedented access into the gang’s world.
For almost a decade, JT allowed him to observe as the gang operated their crack-selling business, evaded the law, made peace (or war) with the neighbors, and rose or fell in the gang’s complex hierarchy.
Gang Leader For A Day: A Rogue Sociologist Takes to The Streets gives an eye-opening view of an “outsider looking at life from the inside” (pg xvi), and tells the story of the complicated friendship that developed between two men who — though they have ambition in common — are from completely different worlds.
