my whole summer vacation this year is a week by the sea.
however, I was able anyway to catch up my reading backlog from last few weeks - books put aside and waiting patiently in their queue. so let’s go faster this time, but through the whole list:
Matthew Syed - The black box method - a great book describing the process of correcting errors; it starts with aviation, which over the last decades has led to a dramatic increase in flight safety. then we are moving to medicine and other sectors. methodical research, inference and drawing conclusions, sometimes contrary to incumbent ’experts’, allows not only to increase security but also to push our understanding of reality and facts forward. great book.
Marcin Meller - Between the Freaks - i have to admit that usually Polish ‘stories of my life’-type of biographies are hard for me to go through. sometimes they just don’t seem interesting enough. Meller piece reads itself.
Marc Goodman - Future crimes - A VERY good book for all laymen - the author pours out of the sleeve examples of how dangerous it has become ‘on the web’. however, it does not avoid constant repetitions of the same examples. sometimes I had the impression that it copies and only slightly modifies individual words in entire parts of individual sections and chapters. nevertheless, a good pillow book for anyone who wants to look more broadly at the problem of IT security.
James Bamford - Puzzle Palace - an old book about the NSA. chronologically earlier than CIA Legacy of ashes and Snowden’s affairs. you can find some interesting tidbits, like for example - encryption of… faxes ;) ).
Wojciech Orliński - Lem - life not from this earth - as a great admirer of Lem, I must say that this book by Wojtek opened my eyes to the huge trauma Lem was carrying through his life. the echoes of the Nazis barbarity and the persecution of Jews are very clearly visible in his work when one looks a little more consciously at Lem’s private fate. excellent development and complementation of Wojtek’s previous position - What are sepulks?.
Stephen Denning - The leader’s guide to storytelling - a position that was already waiting for its turn on the n-th holiday. a bit old already, but efficiently written, giving specific tips and examples. for everyone, even if they do not feel like a ’leader’.
Bill Bryson - A Brief History of Almost Everything - a great book navigating quickly (and with a huge humor flowing from anecdotes)… on probably everything :) it’s worth reading yourself and then passing on to adolescents.