The Great Gatsby by F Scott Fitzgerald

I can't recall if The Great Gatsby was required reading in high school. If it was, I didn't read it (sorry Ms. Patnode). I decided I wanted to read it after a co-worker said it was her favorite book and it was recently made into a movie. I wasn't sure what to expect, knowing it was a classic and written a long time ago. I'm really glad I read the book because I thought it was great.

Nick Carraway moves into a small house on Long Island, surrounded by the wealthy with huge mansions. His neighbor is Jay Gatsby, who has a mysterious past but is always throwing lavish parties. Nick is somewhat new to New York, but he does know Tom and Daisy Buchanan.  Nick spends time with Tom and Daisy and frequents Gatsby's parties. Even with all the wealth and parties, nobody seems to be happy. Everyone is chasing a lover who is entrenched in a relationship. It is a runaway train that cannot possibly have a happy ending.

Nick carries the story, as everything is told from his perspective. And while he is a main character, he remains set back from most of the action. It is really about Gatsby and Daisy and their relationship. They were in love years ago, but a lot has changed since then. It leads to an unimaginable ending but one that I really liked.

The story is well written. The way everything wove together was great. The character's lives intersected like you wouldn't believe. I also thought Fitzgerald's use of adjectives was the best I've read in any book. He was very descriptive and detailed, but his choice of words flowed easily and did not slow me down.

This got me thinking after I finished reading the book...this is a book high school students would enjoy. It's fun and hip. Parties and wealth and relationships. I think if it was presented in that manner, kids would actually read it. But in my opinion, kids don't like reading books that they are required to read or that are from decades or even centuries ago. And while I don't blame them, I think The Great Gatsby is an exception.

My rating for The Great Gatsby: 5 stars out of 5. Get it here!

P.S. I thought I was going to watch the movie this week, but the theater where it was playing stopped showing it.

Blink by Malcolm Gladwell

Malcolm Gladwell is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors. Not necessarily that I agree with everything he writes, but the things he says are thought provoking and written in a concise manner. He weaves examples in and out of the book perfectly. I read his first book, The Tipping Point, a few months ago. A friend recommended reading Blink next. I flew through it. And I've already purchased Outliers, another one of his books.

Blink is about snap judgments, decision making, and unconscious thinking. Malcolm Gladwell's point is maybe we are overthinking too much. He has a ton of interesting examples. The simplest way to explain it is from the first page of the book. A museum wanted to purchase a rare piece of art, but they questioned it's authenticity. They conducted a bunch of research on it, comparing it to fakes, looking up supporting documents, scientifically testing the piece of art. But there was one problem. A few experts who simply looked at the piece of art instantly thought it was a fake. They didn't have any proof, but they could tell. How so? That is what the book seeks to explain.

I will say I wasn't completely convinced. It's hard to tell when you should stop to think and when your should trust your instincts. And Gladwell admits this. There's not one answer that fits every case. But he does try to provide research to support his theories. I found the unconscious many of the stories fascinating.

My rating for Blink: 3 stars out of 5. Get it here!

P.S. Next week is The Great Gatsby. I'm going to try to see the movie after I finish the book to add a little spice to the blog next week.

Divergent by Veronica Roth

 

Blogging full time. Got the laptop back. Finished two books this weekend. Went to Barnes and Noble and picked up a few more yesterday. I decided to blog about Divergent this week, and next week I'll feature Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. I feel like Divergent has been prominently featured on book shelves since it debuted in February. I've picked it up multiple times and thought A) this sounds like The Hunger Games and B) I simply wasn't that intrigued by the description. After a friend suggested the book and asked multiple times if I read it, I decided to give it a shot.

The premise: the country is divided into five states, or factions. Each faction is dedicated to a specific virtue: the honest, the selfless, the brave, the peaceful, and the intelligent. Each year, all sixteen year olds must choose a faction to live in for the rest of their lives, sometimes choosing to abandon their family forever. The main character, Beatrice, is a small girl from the faction of the selfless. She chooses a faction and goes through the initiation process, which is more complicated than you would think. Beatrice is unique and different from a majority of the population, a trait that she knows makes her dangerous, but she doesn't know why. And at the same time, a growing conflict is emerging.

The layout of the story is eerily similar to The Hunger Games. The choice of faction happens fairly quickly, as did the selection of kids for the hunger games. The majority of the story is the initiation process, as the major of the story was the hunger games. The endings happen really quickly, and they are basically the same idea (sorry if that is a spoiler). And to top it all off, there is the meddling romance that carries throughout the story.

I actually thought the first 300 pages were incredible entertaining and enjoyable. The idea of having to pick a virtue for the rest of your life and live it is neat to think about. You never knew what was coming with the next stage of the initiation. My three complaints would be that it was too similar to The Hunger Games, that is wasn't all that believable, and that it was fairly predictable at the end. There's a lot of injections, mind games, simulations, and mind control. That's a bit too sci-fi for me.

The second book is called Insurgent, and it was announced this past week that the third book will be called Allegiant and is being released October 22nd of this year. Debating if I will read them or not. Also, movie rights have already been bought. The first movie will debut in March 2014.

My rating for Divergent: 3.5 stars out of 5. Get it here!

P.S. While I'm mentioning future books, Nicholas Sparks has a new one coming out September 17th called The Longest Ride. I'm going to read it, but after reading the description, I don't think I'm going to like it.

Picking Winners by Andrew Beyer

I was never really into horse racing until a few years ago when a friend brought me up to Saratoga. I thought the experience was a lot of fun. Since then, I've been multiple times every summer. My friend has taken it to a whole new level - he's going to be a part of a TV series on handicapping horse races. Naturally, I thought I would do a bit of reading to get a deeper understanding of the sport. When deciding where to start, I picked up a book that was mentioned in Trading Bases as the bible of horse racing: Picking Winners.

I'm going to offer a disclaimer by saying if you aren't interested in wagering on horse races then you'll find the book boring. Start by going to a track, then maybe you'll find the book useful. I loved how Beyer explains simple concepts. He quickly escalates to more detail using examples and actual outcomes of races. He hits on all aspects of horse racing. He even adds in some humor which fits perfectly. The greatest takeaway of the book is the chapter on money management. In my opinion, that is 50% of the battle in trying to successfully wager, whether it be on horses or any other sport.

The most absurd part about Picking Winners is the fact it was written in 1975. Just about everything he wrote is still relevant today. The speed figures he came up with to measure horses against each other are now used in the Daily Racing Form programs. (You can check if you don't believe me. They're called the Beyer Speed Figures.) The one thing that I would like to see is an updated version with more commentary on the impact of computers, statistics, and predictive modeling. Incredibly, all of his analysis was done by hand and calculator.

My rating for Picking Winners: 4 stars out of 5. Get it here!

P.S. Still no computer. Within the next week I should be able to update these posts with pictures and links.

Updated on Saturday, July 13th (pictures, links, italics)