Sense & Nonsensibility

Dear Dreamers, Over the last year, I read a few books that kept bringing me back to each other, they weren’t similar in concept, and yet they made me realize one thing over and over again.. this- Circumstance, opportunity and our history are the reason we become the people we are. The three books were- Outliers (by Malcolm Gladwell), Einstein’s wife ( by Andrea Gabor) and Half the Sky  ( by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn).  While Outliers is an explanation of how success of the outliers of the world depends as much on their surrounding culture as much on their true genius, Half the Sky is a plea to take action against the most heinous crimes against women around the world and to protect these women against the most macabre human rights violation of our age. Einstein’s Wife ( a loan from my aunt) chronicles the work and lives of five great 20 th century women in the fields of science, art, architecture and the judiciary. Outliers is the story of the unexpecte...

Dear Dreamers, I was introduced to Goodreads http://www.goodreads.com/ - and I have been going through the listopia- the best of 2000s. The list gives you a a variety of good books, and then you can pick the type of books you like to read.  I recently finished reading - The Man in the Rockefeller Suit: The Astonishing Rise and Spectacular Fall of a Serial Impostor by Mark Seal It’s the story of Clark Rockefeller- A German man who moved to the States and over a period of thirty years conned people by assuming various identities, including having a 12 year stint as Clark Rockefeller- a member of the famous American Rockefeller family. During his stint as a Rockefeller- he conned and married a Harvard MBA who worked as a business consultant. She made the big bucks and he spent it. He convinced every one who is the who’s who of the Boston and New Hampshire high life that he was a Rockefeller. Its an astonishing story of how a man reached top brass- landed jobs, entranc...

Dear Dreamers, I recently discovered the Somerville Public library- a couple of months ago now and since I discovered that you can get as many  books as you like, there has been an onslaught of books. I feel like the child stuck with his hand in the cookie jar, there is always one more cookie to grab... To that end, I havent been able to write any more posts of the books I have written recently.Today I talk about the book The Palace of Illusions by Chitra divakaruni that made a great impact on me. I am one of those people who grew up watching Mahabharata on Sunday mornings.  It is a Sanskrit epic with all its intrinsic story telling and loopholes. It is a book with chariots and wars and vows and curses and love stories. It is truely epic. However one thing I realized is that through, all the adaptations of the actual book ( I haven't read the original) - through the stories from my dad, from the tv series we watched on Sundays and all the co...

Dear Dreamers, I recently read this book - ' Conspiracy of Fools: A true Story by Kurt Eichenwald ' This is a book that I read about Enron. The most detailed version of the Enron - the build , the peak, the pedestal and the implosion of a Forbes 50 company.  Written by the Wall street journalist who covered the scandal from its beginning to its end.It focused entirely on the realms and realms of information and gave a very interesting account of the how Kenneth Lay built the company from scratch, hired Jeff Skilling- that brought on board  the culture that got the company to the peak of the hill and then over the cliff. While reading the book ( and I am a scientist so I confess I just skimmed over the accounting details when it got too deep) you realize that ambition and greed are two sides of the same coin. You never know when it starts and the other starts taking over- and Andy Fastow, the CFO of the company was at the epicenter of...

Dear Dreamers, This is my first post of my first blog!!! I am excited!! haha... I love reading books...lots and lots of books! And every once in a while ...ok maybe very often, Ill read something, get distracted and spend the next 20 minutes day dreaming and then legitimately believe I had an epiphany...a lot of these times I may be on the train, at the gym or doing grocery shopping. This explains why I often miss my stop or forget to get the first thing on my grocery list. I call these my street epiphanies!! I 'll start posting about my reads soon. these are not book reviews..these posts are going to be about how the books affect me and the track they lead me on. You are welcome to join into these trains of thoughts.. Bye for now... S