Apex Hides the Hurt, a 2006 novel by American author Colson Whitehead, follows a nameless, emotionally muted nomenclature consultant, or an expert in creating brand names. The novel toggles between the protagonist’s memories of success at his company, and his current consulting assignment—renaming a town. The novel satirizes contemporary American consumer culture and features themes of race and identity. Whitehead uses humor and revelation as key narrative techniques in this story about a man who... Read Apex Hides the Hurt Summary

A Random Walk Down Wall Street by Burton G. Malkiel was originally published in 1973, and it has had 13 editions published to date. Random Walk is a guide to investing, covering the history of crises in investment markets to aid the reader in navigating contemporary investment situations. Random Walk presents in-depth discussions of Balancing Risk and Reward, Comparing Long-Term and Short-Term Goals, and The Psychology of Crowds and Markets, presenting the reader with a... Read A Random Walk Down Wall Street Summary

Argonauts of the Western Pacific: An Account of Native Enterprise and Adventure in the Archipelagoes of Melanesian New Guinea (1922) is an ethnological monograph by Bronislaw Malinowski, a leading anthropologist of his time. It concerns his research in what was then called “Melanesian New Guinea,” which is today known as the Kiriwana island chain, northeast of New Guinea. The work focuses on the trade, magic, and cultural traditions of the Trobriand people on the archipelago... Read Argonauts of the Western Pacific Summary

Artificial Intelligence: A Guide for Thinking Humans (2019) is a nonfiction work by Melanie Mitchell, a computer scientist and complexity theorist affiliated with the Santa Fe Institute. Mitchell is known for her research on analogy-making, cognitive science, and the science of complex systems. In this book, she examines the capabilities and limitations of modern artificial intelligence (AI) with both technical clarity and critical skepticism.Written during a period of intense public excitement about machine learning and... Read Artificial Intelligence Summary

This study guide refers to the 2004 House of Anansi edition of Ronald Wright’s A Short History of Progress. The book is a printed version of five Massey Lectures that Wright delivered in Canada in 2004. Wright is a Canadian author of historical fiction and non-fiction with a background in archaeology, anthropology, and linguistics. This lecture series uses Wright’s unique set of skills as a storyteller and student of history to provide a sweeping and... Read A Short History of Progress Summary

Eminent broadcast journalist Anderson Cooper and historical novelist Katherine Howe reunite to tell the story of one of America’s richest families in Astor: The Rise and Fall of an American Fortune, published in 2023. This family biography follows their earlier collaboration on a book about Cooper’s own prominent ancestors, Vanderbilt: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty, which was recognized on the New York Times bestseller list and the Washington Post Notable Works of... Read Astor Summary

American philosopher John Rawls (1921-2002) published A Theory of Justice in 1971, and the work has become a foundational text in 20th-century political philosophy. A Theory of Justice argues in support of Rawls’s theory of justice-as-fairness, which is based on basic equal rights, equal opportunity, and helping those least advantaged in society. This approach, based on morality and ethics, is presented as an alternative to the theory of utilitarianism, in which the ends justify the... Read A Theory of Justice Summary

The novel Atlas Shrugged (1957) was written by Russian American author Ayn Rand. Widely considered to be the author’s magnum opus, Atlas Shrugged is a divisive text that has remained popular in the public consciousness despite harsh criticism from academics and philosophers across the political spectrum. Set in a dystopian US wherein the collectivist government bureaucracy has a stranglehold on industry, the narrative follows protagonist Dagny Taggart as she fights to defend her family’s transcontinental... Read Atlas Shrugged Summary

James Clear’s Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits and Break Bad Ones is a guide to adopting good behaviors through incremental changes to your everyday routines. Avery first published the book in 2018, and this guide refers to the ebook edition. The book has unique pagination, with the page numbers beginning again at the start of each new chapter. Clear likely numbered his book this way because of his emphasis... Read Atomic Habits Summary

Automating Inequality: How High-Tech Tools Profile, Police, and Punish the Poor (2018) by political scientist Virginia Eubanks chronicles the history of the welfare support system in the US, focusing on its widening inadequacies due to the rise of automation and artificial intelligence technologies. While proponents of these techniques believe them to be revolutionary solutions, Eubanks argues that despite promising to “shake up hidebound bureaucracies” and “increase transparency,” the new regime of data analytics “is simply... Read Automating Inequality Summary

Daniel H. Pink’s A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future, released in 2005, considers and challenges society’s history of valuing left-brained attributes over creative and empathic right-brained thinkers. Pink, an author of several books on business and human behavior, argues that the age of left-brain supremacy is over, making way for whole-minded thinkers who will define and thrive within the coming Conceptual Age. Pink offers six essential whole-minded aptitudes that are key... Read A Whole New Mind Summary

A World in Disarray: American Foreign Policy and the Crisis of the Old Order is a nonfiction book by Richard Haass, published in 2017, that deals with foreign relations from an American perspective. Haass is a longtime diplomat who served several administrations from the 1980s to the 2000s. He was a special assistant to President George H. W. Bush, and as an official in the State Department, he was a close advisor to Colin Powell... Read A World In Disarray Summary

One of the great corporate frauds of the 21st century, the Theranos blood-test scam, is brought to light in the award-winning bestseller Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup, published in 2018 and updated in 2020. Author John Carreyrou, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and bureau chief at The Wall Street Journal, brings his years of experience to the case against tech startup Theranos and its spellbinding CEO, Elizabeth Holmes. The Vintage Books... Read Bad Blood Summary

Gabriel García Márquez (1927-2014) was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for Literature in 1982. He was born in Aracataca, Colombia and received a Jesuit education and studied law before becoming a journalist. After being sent to Rome on assignment, García Márquez spent much of his life travelling. Though Cuban novelist Alejo Carpentier coined the term magical realism, to describe a storytelling style that blends mundane and magical elements, this term and style are now widely... Read Balthazar's Marvelous Afternoon Summary

Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco (1989) by Bryan Burrough and John Helyar is regarded as one of the most important business histories based on investigative journalism. The book was born out of The Wall Street Journal's coverage of the 1988 leveraged buyout (LBO) of food-and-tobacco company RJR Nabisco—the largest deal of its kind in history at that time. Barbarians at the Gate features the biographies of key players, including F. Ross... Read Barbarians at the Gate Summary

Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error (2010) is a nonfiction book written by Kathryn Schulz, a journalist who has written for publications such as the New York Times Magazine, the Nation, and the Boston Globe. The book explores the nature of error from a psychological, philosophical, and personal point of view, drawing from philosophical thought, psychology studies, and personal anecdotes. Some themes of the book include the fallibility of the human mind, the... Read Being Wrong Summary

Benjamin Franklin: An American Life is a biography by Walter Isaacson published in 2003 by Simon & Schuster. It depicts this American Founding Father as instrumental in developing the American character, ensuring the independence of the United States, and promoting democracy. The book became a New York Times bestseller. Isaacson is a journalist and professor of history at Tulane University who has published biographies of other notable figures such as Albert Einstein, Leonardo Da Vinci... Read Benjamin Franklin: An American Life Summary

Harvard-educated Dr. Atul Gawande is a staff writer for The New Yorker, a surgeon at Brigham and Women's Hospital, and founder of two nonprofits aimed at innovating surgical practices around the world. He wrote Better: A Surgeon’s Notes on Performance to explore the attributes that make a good doctor. Published in 2007 as a follow-up to his 2002 National Book Award Finalist Complications: A Surgeon's Notes on an Imperfect Science, Better explores “how situations of... Read Better Summary

Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear (2015) is a self-help guide by author and journalist Elizabeth Gilbert. This New York Times bestseller outlines six elements of creativity: courage, permission, enchantment, persistence, trust, and divinity. Gilbert uses anecdotes from her life and writing career, as well as the work of others, to explain these concepts, and presents her views and philosophical musings about creativity and inspiration. The work explores themes such as The Importance of Play... Read Big Magic Summary

Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People is a nonfiction social psychology book written by psychologists Mahzarin R. Banaji and Anthony G. Greenwald. Both authors have received several prestigious awards and served as editors for scholarly journals in psychology. They have also published dozens of other academic works in their field. Published in 2013, Blindspot received a number of positive reviews and was a New York Times best seller. It is one of many books that... Read Blindspot Summary