Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Books To Read
Books To Read
Literature
A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki
This is a wonderfully written novel about empathy, nature, mortality, zen and quantum
mechanics. A good reminder of how we are all connected and all trying to find our place for the
time being.
Recommended by Benedetta Berti
Foundation by Isaac Asimov
Asimov was a masterful fringe thinker, and this first book in the Foundation series shows just
how attuned he was to possible and plausible future scenarios. Although its 50 years old,
Foundation is especially provocative reading given our current state of world affairs in order
to save humankind and the vast knowledge we have accumulated, the main character gathers the
smartest thinkers and forms a secret society. But that doesnt go exactly as planned, either.
Recommended by Amy Webb
Fugitive Pieces: A Novel by Anne Michaels
Anne Michaelss poetic collage about love and loss and escaping the wounds of Europe to
construct a fresh future in the New World remains one of the novels Im always thrilled to
recommend to friends in part because Im fairly sure theyre about to recommend it to me. Its
moving and beautiful and ageless, and nothing quite like it has ever been written.
Recommended by Pico Iyer
The Forsyte Saga by John Galsworthy
This is cheating, because its a series of novels! Like so many great novels of the 19th and early
20th centuries, very little actually happens, but the characters and their world are painted so well,
and so truthfully, that every page becomes a thing of almost unbearable beauty.
Recommended by Simon Anholt
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
This is one of those books where you feel like you have fallen deeply into someone elses
dream. Its an epic World War II story, but its the tenderness on every page that is haunting.
Recommended by Rachel Botsman
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bront
I read this when I was eight. And Ive read it a few times since, and watched it onscreen too.
Nothing dulls it or stops me loving small, plain Jane, a Yorkshire lass like me, who had more
spirit and fire in her 150 years ago than I probably do today, with all my modern freedoms and
privilege. I love the story because it is a tale of a woman becoming free, while still being a
classic love story. I mean, theres even a madwoman in the attic. But I love Jane because I love
Charlotte too: a woman who triumphed in a deeply patriarchal world, getting published and
getting famous, while living in a cold, glum vicarage on the edge of the moors. Emily Bronts
Wuthering Heights is seen as a trickier, better book by many, because they are fooled by the
romance of Jane Eyre. Look behind that, and you find a character as complex and wonderful as
any Cathy or Heathcliff, in little, plain Jane, who would always rather be happy than
dignified.
Recommended by Rose George
The Vegetarian: A Novel by Han Kang
This is the first full-length novel by South Korean literary star Han Kang to be made available
in English. It tells the story of a woman who suddenly stops eating meat, a shock decision that
fractures her family relationships, allowing glimpses of the traumas, assumptions and impossible
dreams that lie beneath. The writing is stunning: poetic, alluring, troubling and strange. And the
drama keeps you turning the pages to the end. Fabulous.
Recommended by Ann Morgan
Everything I Dont Remember by Jonas Hassen Khemiri
I could have mentioned all sorts of smart journalistic literature on my main topics of
digitalization and democracy, but as a reporter, I have a strong and constant need to refuel with
the stories and the language of artists. Khemiri just won Augustpriset, one of the finest Swedish
literary awards, and rightfully so. This novel is a state-of-the-art literary composition, made with
heart and mind and craftsmanship at the highest level. When it is released in English during
2016, I expect Jonas Hassen Khemiri to conquer the world.
Recommended by Andreas Ekstrm
The Neapolitan Novels by Elena Ferrante
These four novels tell the story of two friends, Lila and Elena, as they grow up in a poor
Neapolitan neighborhood, escape and return. These books are brilliant, utterly compelling in
their dissection of friendship and family storytelling at its most powerful.
Recommended by Hilary Cottam
Remainder by Tom McCarthy
I love this book because its about a man who has a traumatic head injury and decides to spend
all his settlement money re-enacting memories hes never had. If you like books about obsessive
people, repetition and old ladies cooking copious amounts of liver, this book is for you.
Recommended by Gabriel Barcia-Colombo
Tech
Where Wizards Stay Up Late by Katie Hafner
Its the remarkable and rarely told story of the people who created the internet. For all its
ubiquity and importance in the modern world, we tend to forget that the internet was the result of
imagination, hard work and remarkable feats of engineering from a relatively small group of
brilliant people. One day the people behind the first networked computing in the late 1960s and
early 1970s might be held in the same regard as Fleming, Faraday or Edison. Where Wizards
Stay Up Late tells their story in meticulous (and occasionally quite funny such as the very
first word ever transmitted online, which was lo before the system crashed) detail. Anyone who
is interested in where the internet came from, and why it was designed like it was which
really should be all of us must read this book.
Recommended by Jamie Bartlett
The Most Human Human: What Artificial Intelligence Teaches Us About Being Alive by
Brian Christian
A delightful and insightful exploration of what we mean by human intelligence. Christian
memorably uses the metaphor of thinking in the book, drawn from chess, to illuminate not only
chess (Deep Blue didnt really beat Garry Kasparov) but also a whole range of human
experiences, like how one might end up in a threesome in a bathtub with no idea what to do next,
or how to be fully present in a conversation with a stranger.
Recommended by Rebecca Saxe
Data-ism by Steve Lohr
Theres so much hype out there about big data, and in my work at Wired and now at Iodine
Ive been responsible for some share of it. Lohrs book thankfully discerns the real power and
limitations of data-driven decisions. He finds the humanity in the subject, and makes a strong
case that data is only going to be an ever-more powerful force in business and society, for good
and ill.
Recommended by Thomas Goetz
Science
Brilliant Green: The Surprising History and Science of Plant Intelligence by Stefano Mancuso
Some books just change the way you look at the world. This book that asks, are plants
intelligent? is one of them.
Recommended by Sugata Mitra
How We Got to Now: Six Innovations That Made the Modern World by Steven Johnson
This book really showed me the amazing pathways that led to innovations that make our lives
work today. The stories are told almost like a dramatic mystery to make the history come to life
with excitement and aha moments.
Recommended by Bill Gross
Leaving Orbit: Notes from the Last Days of American Spaceflight by Margaret Lazarus Dean
I love how Lazarus Dean notices unexpected details and tells her story in unexpected ways.
children about protecting the environment, social activism and standing up for what is right.
Recommended by Benedetta Berti
Justice
Guantanamo Diary by Mohamedou Ould Slahi, edited by Larry Seims
A heartbreaking and humorous memoir of a still-detained inmate from Guantanamo Bay.
Learning English from the guards and interrogators who kept him company, he began to put pen
to paper about his experience in the controversial prison. The papers would consistently get
confiscated. After seven years, his legal team was able to secure the release of 400+ pages that
Slahi had written. The book is masterfully compiled by Larry Seims. Never in my life have I
read an account so alive, so full of compassion. This book is mandatory reading for all
Americans.
Recommended by Bassam Tariq
Writing My Wrongs: Life, Death and Redemption in an American Prison by Shaka Senghor
After a few pages, I knew this book was going to alter my perception on incarceration in
America, as we need to hear first-hand stories straight from people who were systematically put
there rather than through Hollywood movies or researchers or journalists. Throughout the whole
book, I was like, This is happening right in my backyard? Shaka spent 19 years transferring
from one prison to another and experiencing each ones subculture and unwritten rules. His
words are honest and very necessary, and I hope they will help humanize incarceration policies.
Or, better, to use education and mentorship to find a way to prevent young kids from being
incarcerated. Their bodies do not belong to any system or country but themselves, and it is our
responsibility to listen.
Recommended by Christine Sun Kim
Unjust Deeds: The Restrictive Covenant Cases and the Making of the Civil Rights Movement
by Jeffrey D. Gonda
This book tells the story of six African-American families who won a landmark Supreme Court
case attacking housing discrimination in the years after World War II. I love it because of the
richness of the writing, the timeliness and importance of the topic, but most of all because of the
people whose stories it tells. Its a reminder of the extraordinary power that individuals can have
when they decide to take a stand for justice.
Recommended by Jedidah Isler
My Bondage and My Freedom by Frederick Douglass
No man can put a chain about the ankle of his fellow man without at last finding the other end
fastened about his own neck. To me, this quote perfectly illustrates the effect that slavery had on
those who were raised to uphold its tenets. That a system can be a detriment even to those that
may benefit from it I find incredibly poignant even in todays society. Its so important that we
recognize the implications of our beliefs both in how they affect ourselves as well as others. My
Bondage and My Freedom not only taught me about the cruel reality of slavery but also showed
that in the most depraved systems humanity will seek to reach its potential no matter what
obstacles are placed in its path.
Recommended by Zak Ebrahim
Self-Help
Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear by Elizabeth Gilbert
Forget what you think about Eat, Pray, Love. Gilbert has a phenomenal lens on how creativity
really works. Throughout the book, she reminds you that if you take creativity off a precious
pedestal and just keep working on something, magic does happen.
Recommended by Rachel Botsman
Willpower: Why Self-Control Is the Secret to Success by Roy F. Baumeister and John Tierney
I love this book because it explained so many things to me about me. Willpower is, quite
clearly, a primary tool for success in work and love. And this book is packed with gripping
stories about those who have struggled with temptation (from Oprah and Eric Clapton to Henry
Morton Stanley and more) that vividly illustrate how to engage this precious fuel, willpower, to
win in business and romance. And I finally know why, after days of being soooo good, I get to
an airport and go wild on sweets. This book reaches deep into those most fascinating topics:
human nature; how the brain and body work; why we do the things we do; and how to battle our
darker angels to succeed in life.
Recommended by Helen Fisher
Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck
Dwecks treatise on growth versus fixed mindsets has been extraordinarily influential in my
professional and personal life. One of the greatest things that holds us back from reaching our
full potential is fear of failure. By believing that we can grow and change our abilities through
hard work and grit, we can get past that fear and unlock all sorts of possibilities in ourselves.
Recommended by Margaret Gould Stewart
Poetry
The Essential Rumi by Jalal al-Din Rumi, translation by Coleman Barks
Its a book of poetry by a 13th-century Sufi poet who talks in most honest and transparent ways
of all human emotions. The poems never failed to bring perspective in my daily life. And it
always creates an immediate connection when I meet someone who has read it.
Recommended by Zainab Salbi