Four Stars

I’ve been reading at a faster clip now that I’m actually done with the Cannonball. Or at least, it feels like it. Maybe it’s because the pressure is off. This latest book comes courtesy of that old traveler’s standby, Hudson News. Even though I have about 20 unread books on my Kindle – including that bastard book five of A Song of Ice and Fire – I always wander into this newsstand/bookstore when I’m at the airport. This book caught my eye and I’m really glad it did.

Ms. Cahalan was a reporter at the New York Post when she started acting strangely. She was paranoid, manic, and even started to have seizures. One doctor thought she was an alcoholic; she eventually was admitted to an epilepsy ward at NYU, where she underwent tests as her condition deteriorated. Was she having a nervous breakdown? Was she bi-polar? Was she sick with something that was physically altering her brain?

It is not a spoiler to say that doctors eventually figured out what was going on. But the journey to get there is fascinating, especially because Ms. Cahalan serves as both the subject as well as the author, but not in the traditional memoir way. Because she has very few memories of that time, she treats herself as the subject of a story. She pursues answers and creates a narrative the way she would a feature story; in fact the book stems from a feature she wrote about herself once she returned to her position at the Post.

The book is well-written, interesting, and compelling. The story it tells is terrifying in some respects, but hopeful in others.

Three Stars

Last week I purchased four books on sugar. Motivated by all the holiday sweets around, I remembered the last book I read last year – Good Calories, Bad Calories – and thought maybe I needed a bit of a refresher on nutrition. I searched for a few books, and I decided to start here.

The book is heavily academic, and focuses mostly on the author’s own research. Although much of it describes scientific study, it isn’t hard to read. Dr. Yudkin is interested in the effects of sugar not just as a cause of diabetes (and it’s important to note my use of the word “a” and not “the”) but as a factor contributing to the increase of heart disease and many other ailments. His research runs in direct opposition of Dr. Ancel Keys, who claims that dietary fat is the cause of heart disease, not. I have to say that Dr. Yudkin’s research is, when coupled with what I read last year in Good Calories, Bad Calories, more convincing.

Dr. Yudkin’s research is especially interesting because it focuses on sugar and not all refined carbohydrates; he is not making the argument that white bread is going to cause illness. And he backs that up with research. In many studies he compares rats fed the same diets except in one group they have added sugar and in the other they have added carbohydrates; in the former the rats have adverse reactions whereas in the latter they generally do not.

I appreciate the book because Dr. Yudkin is quite clear in his arguments that sugar is not the SOLE cause of really much of anything – and even some people who the evidence would suggest should get illnesses based on their consumption of sugar won’t because of other environmental factors. It’s interesting, because the way I read the book, it seems like Dr. Yudkin’s critics want him to only make his claims if he can show sugar is the sole cause of something, or that sugar will definitely cause it. Which is ridiculous, considering smoking is definitely a cause of lung cancer, but not everyone who smokes will get lung cancer.

The book’s last chapter is sort of fascinating, because Dr. Yudkin discusses the ways in which the sugar industry – either directly or via allegedly independent nutrition councils – has tried to discredit or silence Dr. Yudkin. It’s distressing, but it reminds me a bit of when I worked at a pharmaceutical company, and they spent a lot of time trying to discredit an author of a book critical of the industry before the book even came out. When money is involved, people get really defensive.

The main reason I don’t give this book a higher rating is because I think there are others out that that do it better. The book itself is also quite old; I believe this version is from the 80s. Based on other books I’ve read it appears his theories have been supported with evidence since then, but it seems like the best bet is to read a more recent version to have a better picture of why I really need to cut as much sugar out of my diet as possible. But probably not during the holidays. That’s just asking for failure.

Five Stars

I was listening to the radio earlier this week and heard them discussing the movie version of Still Alice, starring Julianne Moore. It sounded interesting, so I started reading it on Thursday, and finished it while at the gym today. The writing was fantastic, the story was interesting and moving, and the small world Ms. Genova created took me in from the first page.

Still Alice tells the story of a cognitive psychology Harvard professor who, at age 51, is diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s. She has a professor husband and three grown children, and is forced to figure out how she is going to handle this diagnosis. The book unfolds month by month, from before the diagnosis, through telling the family and as the disease progresses. What makes the story different are two things: first, that it addresses early-onset Alzheimer’s (as opposed to Alzheimer’s affecting people in their 80s), and second, that it is told from the perspective of the person with the diagnosis, not the caregiver.

The book is devastating, but not so sorrowful that I found myself depressed by reading it. I really cared about Alice and her family. In fact, I cared so much for her family that I would love to have seen the story told from multiple perspectives (Alice’s husband and her three children, for example), although at that point the book would be 1,000 pages long. But those would be 1,000 pages I’d read. The characters are interesting and flawed – not everyone acts perfectly, and not everyone is wholly sympathetic. By have the main character Alice have multiple children and a spouse, the author can show us how different people might process the diagnosis.

Beyond that, though, and most importantly, Ms. Genova slowly, throughout the book, really shows us what Alice’s experience is as the dementia gets worse and worse. From early on, when she gets lost in a place she’s been daily for dozens of years, to later on, when she can no longer follow the plot of the book she’s reading, the reader gets as much of a sense as possible of what the person with Alzheimer’s experiences.

I got this from my sister for Christmas last year. The only profession I can recall really wanting (as much as little kid wants anything) was astronaut. Of course I didn’t actually do the things one would need to do, like join the military, to do that (and my vision would have disqualified me before anything else did). But I still talk about going to space someday.

This book is different from Mary Roach’s “Packing for Mars” in a good way: it’s told from the perspective of an astronaut from Canada who has been to space three times, including as commander of the International Space Station. The book is a memoir of his time preparing for, supporting, and traveling to space, and is framed as a way to be successful in life on Earth.

He makes some great observations, including a chapter on sweating the small stuff (you should) and treating the things that lead up to the big events (going to space) as just as important as those big events. It makes sense – if everything is focused on these large events that may or may not happen, and that’s all that is seen as worthwhile, everything else (the vast majority of life) will seem like a waste, or sad. And while it might not be this dire for all of us, his advice of being as prepared as possible and thinking about the ‘next thing that will kill me’ can be helpful too.

I also really liked his discussion of being a minus one, a zero, or a plus one. His idea is that we are all one of those things in each role we fill, and those who come in aiming to be a plus one when they are new on the scene tend to end up as a minus one. He suggest we all aim to be a zero (someone who doesn’t screw things up, but isn’t the champion), and by doing that, as we develop expertise in the area, we eventually will end up being a plus one.

I think that with many of his suggestions you could argue that there is a downside (if you’re focused on the small stuff, how do you look at the bigger picture), but I also think it depends on perspective. In that example, you look at the big picture but then break it down into much smaller steps to complete to get there, and care about each of those steps. Which actually seems to match most of the advice people give with things like goals and resolutions. My goal might be to buy a house, but I can’t just say that and then it happens. There are a lot of smaller steps involved, and each of those involves smaller steps, and it makes sense to lay them out and work at doing those steps well.

I’d recommend this book for sure – it was a pretty quick read for 300 pages, and his writing is interesting and vivid. If you aren’t going to get a chance to read it, though, please check out the video the author put together while on the ISS. You may have seen it before. It’s pretty great.

Four Stars

I’m doing decently well in my career, but until this year I haven’t really supervised anyone full time. My first employee is young, and eager to learn, and I want to figure out how to be a good manager for her while also ensuring the work gets done well.

So I went in search of a good management book for someone like me. Let me tell you – the business and management section of most bookstores is bleak. It’s like the self-help section (odd cover art, weird fonts, bizarre titles), but without the soul. However, this book stood out as one that seemed less distressing and focused on money. Ms. Pollak has built her career providing advice and coaching to others, and with this book she is targeting the millennial generation, as they are the ones starting to step into leadership roles for the first time. Now, I am technically Generation X, but a lot of what she shares in this book still applies.

She starts with a history of business and management philosophies, which is a good place to find more books to read on this topic. She then moves in to ways to ‘learn,’ ‘lead,’ and ‘last.’ She has great suggestions on social networking, managing conflict, and different management styles. The way she presents the information worked really well for me; when I finished reading it I went through and copied down all the parts I really wanted to remember into a book so I would follow up on the items. I’m not going to end up doing everything she suggested, but I feel good about the ones I plan to pursue.

My only complaint is this one section, where she talks about outsourcing what you can. “If it will save you time for more important personal or professional priorities, why not hire a virtual assistant or intern to take care of tasks such as grocery shopping, scheduling haircuts and doctor’s appointments, running errands, hanging your new curtains, or even doing your holiday shopping?” Virtual assistant? Sure. But intern? I disagree. An intern should be learning about whatever field they are working in, so unless they are interning as a virtual assistant, suggesting people get one to hang curtains strikes me as inappropriate.

Despite that misstep (at least she didn’t suggest hiring an UNPAID intern), I feel good recommending this to others looking for a not-cheesy management book.

Five Stars

“A colleague once told her, Wilson said, ‘We want autonomy for ourselves and safety for those we love.’ That remains the main problem and paradox for the frail.”

The above quote sums up beautifully much of what Dr. Gawande discusses in this really lovely, interesting and motivating book. Being Mortal focuses on how modern medicine has failed us in that it can keep people alive much longer than it used to, but often at a very serious cost. His focus is primarily on the elderly, but he also includes the seriously, terminally ill in this exploration.

Think about the above quote. We all want to do what we want – to have the freedom to decide when we will get up in the morning, what we will eat, and who we will spend time with. But, when it comes to our loved ones, it seems that so often what we most want is for them to be safe. It is that concern that has led us to do things like put people into nursing homes to keep them safe from falls, even though they are much more miserable. As long as they are safe, that’s all that matters. But Dr. Gawande makes the very compelling argument that the safety isn’t the primary concern, or shouldn’t be. Allowing people to live meaningful lives, whatever the person’s own definition, should be our concern as people age or experience the end stages of a terminal illness.

The book does a great job of illustrating how doctors really shy away from having the frank conversations with their seriously ill patients. They provide information, but that information is often based on what to do to lengthen life, not improve the quality of it. Taking a page from the palliative care / hospice movement, Dr. Gawande advocates for asking the hard questions, like what do the patients fear most, what is the quality of life they’d be willing to tolerate, and similar questions, to really get at the heart of their concern.

Dr. Gawande also looks at how, especially with the elderly, we focus too much on keeping them safe as opposed to happy. He provides the back story on the nation’s first true assisted living facility, where residents were allowed to do things like lock their doors. Yes, they might fall, but the staff was dedicated to providing whatever support services were necessary to allow these residents to keep as much independence as possible. It is amazing when you really think about how much we focus on things like fall prevention (which is important, obviously), but not on really figuring out ways to prevent the falls WHILE allowing people access to the things in their lives that matter, like deciding when to get out of bed in the morning.

I strongly recommend this book, especially for those who have parents who are elderly, or for those who care about the quality of life of seriously ill people. It asks us to reframe our thinking, and really consider what it is that we value, and how we would want others to take that into consideration as we got older or sicker.

And with that, I complete my second Cannonball Read.

Five Stars

Last year I reviewed a book about a forensic anthropologist, where I mentioned I do work related to death. It is one part of what I do, and (at least for now) has never actually involved me providing after-death care, or even arranging for it. It’s a possibility, though. And it is a field that I find unendingly interesting.

I can’t remember who recommended this book to me, but I’d like to say thank you. Its premise is one young woman’s experience working in a crematory. Most of the book – I’d say maybe 70% – involves stories from her time there, seamlessly woven with interesting notes about how different cultures have handled death of the millennia. She does a really fantastic job at this, especially since this is her first book. The book takes a bit of a shift towards the dark about three-quarters of the way through (I know, how much darker can it get? It’s a book about death! But it does), but it finishes up nicely.

Ms. Doughty’s book points out all of the ways that we have turned death into something to be hidden and feared. This is a relatively new construction – at least the hidden part. Many cultures have feared death forever, and some have just seen it as a way of life. Ms. Doughty, while a part of the death care industry, learns through her experiences that she wants to provide a different way of understanding and recognizing death. I’ve not yet read any of her blog posts (http://www.orderofthegooddeath.com/) but I plan to, because I find her perspective interesting.

I bought this book at 1 P.M. today; I’m writing the review just before 6 P.M. I literally only put the book down to use the bathroom and to fold some laundry. That’s it. And at 240 pages, it’s not a short book. But it’s an interesting one, and one that I think has value not just for those who find the death care industry interesting, but for those who think that maybe there’s something missing from how we handle death in the U.S.