Jace Mouse.com :: Personal : Books


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Personal : Books

10.03.03

	*On the Road* Jack Kerouac 06.15.2003 This is the book that spawned the Beat Generation. It follows a loose-knit group of friends through a series of exuberant travels across 1950's America. It chronicles a burning compulsion to live life beyond the boundaries of any ensuing consequences. I can't comprehend living a life like this. I can't fathom it. I try to dismiss it. And that is why I read about it. Books like this refine me. They assault the boundaries of my thinking. They de-base my misconceptions, and they cement my core beliefs. Read it. "Now, Sal, we're leaving everything behind us and entering a new unknown phase of things. All the years and troubles and kicks -- and now this! so that we can safely think of nothing else and just go on ahead with our faces stuck out like this, you see, and understand the world as, really and genuinely speaking, other Americans haven't done before us..."

	*I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings* Maya Angelou 08.15.2003 This is generally a "chick book," but I found it worthwhile reading. The book is an engaging true-life account of a young black girl, growing up in the segregated society of the 1950's. The book pulled me into a life that is very opposite my own upbringing and existence. The book was very engaging and provoking. "The white kids were going to have a chance to become Galileos and Madame Curries and Edisons and Gauguins, and our boys (the girls weren't even in on it) were going to try to be Jesse Owenses and Joe Lewises." "I find it interesting that the meanest life, the poorest existence, is attributed to God's will, but as human beings become more affluent, as their living standard and style begin to ascend the material scale, God descends the scale of responsibility at a commensurate speed." "The needs of society determine its ethics, and in the Black American ghettos the hero is the one who is offered only crumbs from his country's table but by ingenuity and courage is able to take for himself a Lucullan feast. Hence, the janitor who lives in one room but sports a robin's-egg-blue Cadillac is not laughed at but admired, and the domestic of buys forty- dollar shoes is not criticized but appreciated."

	*To Kill a Mockingbird* Harper Less 03.15.2003 This book makes for enjoyable reading. The book is essentially a collection of short stories, told from the perspective on a young white girl in the segregationist South. It is a delicate exploration of the relationships between father, sibling, and society. The most interesting theme through the book is the maturation of the main character, as misperceptions of a child succumb to the revelations of adolescence.

	Into Thin Air "But there are men for whom the unattainable has a special attraction." -Walt Unsworth from Everst This book reports on true events that occurred one fateful day high atop Mt. Everest (29,000 ft). John Krakauer, a journalist on assignment for Outside magazine, reached the summit on May 10, 1986. He hadn't slept in fifty-seven hours. Behind him were twenty other climbers, still pressing toward the top. In this narrative, Krakauer describes the unfortunate chain of events that occurred that Spring -- events that cost several climbers their lives. This is a great book, regardless of your interest or talent for climbing. It provides amazing insight into the dogged determination of the human spirit. That dogged determination, allowed some to endure and survive. And there on Everest, that same determination pushed others to their death... I read this book in the Fall of 2000, while hiking the Inca Trail in Peru.

	21 Indispensable Qualities of a Leader John Maxwell has developed a reputation for delivering inspiring perspectives on leadership and life. This book is no exception. The book is broken into 21 chapters, meant to be read over the course of 21 (or more days). It hasn't been as inspiring as I had hoped, but it's definitely worthwhile, nonetheless. In particular, I liked the opportunities for self-examination that conclude each chapter.