Quantum Leaps. 100 Scientists who changed the World. Jon Balchin.  2014 ISBN  9781782126935. A delightful English book that does a great job of linking innovative thinking from Pythagorus to Tim Berners-Lee through the centuries. The author does a good job in that he takes what could be confusing information and distills it into easily managed amounts of concise readable  information.  I enjoyed the chance to review my understanding of theoretical physics, plus I picked up more information on the life-science front.   Recommend this book to anyone who wants to add to his/her educated person background.   Quite fascinating read that holds your attention and for me added to the desire to learn more about some of these interesting characters.

Launch Tomorrow. From Product Idea to Launch in A Day. Luke Szyrmer. This concise and clearly written book is firmly in the Agile marketing camp.  If you  are looking for a book to get you started on effective landing pages this is a good one.  Yet it goes one better. The basic premise is that you want to create effective landing pages to test out product ideas where you do not have a product yet.   Brilliant. Test the prospects reaction before you blow the dollars on a product that is likely to fail.  Now this may not happen in every market , but the idea has great merit.  For years our firm has advocated testing the market to help you build what prospects need/want/will buy rather than having the product come first.   Very good book and I recommend if you are in product management/development/marketing you get it!

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The Reluctant Jesus. Duncan Whitehead. 2014.   What if The Messiah was actually here?  But God had not told him for 30 years who he was, what he was going to do and what was involved?  That is the core of this tongue in cheek, amusing story.   Clearly written and fun  to read, this is a good “summer’ escape book.   It should be taken as a bit of fun and not more.

It Doesn’t Take a Hero. The autobiography of General H. Norman Schwarzkopf.  cw Peter Petre. 1992. ISBN 9780307764997.  Partially a book on Middle East  history ,  military strategy , geopolitics and a view into the mind of a singular leader.  It is compelling stuff to see how events in the authors life shaped him toward becoming the Commander in Chief of Desert Storm.  His personal details of home are often missing from sanitized autobiographies.  This book rings true. It is concise and too the point.  It also points to the ongoing ability of the US forces to get a job done when asked.  Good book for a cross country flight as it moves right along.

Finders & Keepers. How the world’s most powerful customer is changing everything. Rob Schlyecher.2015. ISBN 9780994059307. The book is an application of work by Christopher Norton and the authors company Spring Advertising on the market vertical called the New Economic Order, or as the author calls it Finders. Finders are less than half the population, yet control 75% of the discretionary spending.  Keepers (bargain hunters, sit on their wallets and thus have a very small part of the spending).  If your product is too often all about the price ( Cars, real estate, commodities) then you are talking ot the Keepers. In other word, a race to the bottom.  Finders are foodies, love the artisan, look for out of the way shops,  love the authentic experience. Finders will often pay full retail as they respect the product value. Eg Lululemon, Subaru, iPhone, Trader Joe’s, Brew pubs, Vinyl records.  Keepers love WalMart. The premise is very easy to grasp, but the application can be difficult if your company is not Finder friendly or oriented.  Worthwhile book to read, and clearly written ( They must write good copy at Spring) . Every marketer should read this one., if only for the fascinating case studies.

Thieves of State. Why corruption threatens global security. Sarah Chayes.2015. ISBN 9780393246537.  This is quite the book. It was suggested to me by David Mouton and I am glad he did.  The author details how various corrupt governments today ( Afghanistan, Egypt, Tunisia, Nigeria for eg)  have been seized by kleptocracies so that the national revenue flows into the hands of the ruling few. She also shows how the individual living in these places gets caught between the religious right and the corrupt administration to the point that uprising seems the only option. Especially galling is that the Western powers and NGOs seem to always align with the corrupt administration, so the West is seen as part of the problem.   She makes a very good case ( and worked in several of these countries on this) , the the West should be very concerned about dealing with corrupt administration/systems that are in all intents criminal in nature..  That is if thee West is interested in helping these populations have any alternatives to violence.  She has some pretty good dirt on the CIA and US State department as well.  Of course she also shows how the control of the US govt by Wall Street interest was not that short of being criminal.

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