During late May, I finished reading Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcom Gladwell. I read about the book in a series of columns that Bill Simmons did with Malcom Gladwell. Rather than doing a podcast, the two of them did three columns of over 9,000 words back and forth.

Gladwell looks at why some people succeed, while so many more never reach their potential. He suggests that superstars are invariably the beneficiaries of hidden advantages, extraordinary opportunities and cultural legacies that allow them to learn, work hard and make sense of the world in ways others cannot.

As a parent, his thoughts on how opportunities and repetitions make people successful struck a chord with me. With one of my goals in life is to support Jack, Drew and Morgan to be as successful as possible, it provided some thoughts about how this might be accomplished.

This is a light, quick read; I finished it in four days. Nevertheless, I really enjoyed the book. I highly recommend it and I am going to add his other two books to my pile to read in the future.

Looking for a book to read on the East Coast trip during June, I settled on The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper. The book appealed to me on three different levels.

First, Cooperstown is named for James Fenimore Cooper’s father. James lived there as a child and during several periods during his adult life. After serving as a seaman, James returned to Cooperstown and settled at Fenimore Farm, the site of the Fenimore Art Museum, as a gentleman farmer. Sharon and I went through the Fenimore Art Museum.

Second, The Last of the Mohicans is set in Upper New York State about an hour north of Cooperstown. During my trail run while we were at Cooperstown, the terrain that I was running through felt very much like the descriptions on the countryside in the book. Much of James Fenimore Cooper’s writing is based his childhood experiences in and around Lake Otsego and the surrounding area.

Third, the center point of the story is the massacre that follows the surrender of Fort William Henry during the French and Indian War. Since reading His Excellency, the George Washington biography, I have been intrigued by the French and Indian Wars. Washington’s reputation really has it roots in several battles in this war.

Written in 1825, It was one of the most popular English-language novels of its time. Criticized for its long sentences and formal prose, I found the book very readable and well paced. I enjoyed the book a great deal.

On the way back from the east coast trip, I started reading Walking to Guantanamo. I had heard the author interviewed on the NPR Books podcast last fall. In the last year, I have read Havana Nocturne about the Mob in Cuba in the 1950’s and An Unfinished Life about John F. Kennedy. Obviously, Cuba and Castro played a central role in JFK’s Presidency. Both of these books sparked my curiosity in Cuba. As result, when I heard the interview I bought the book.

Partly in response to a mid-life crisis, the author treks the length of Cuba. Although he starts off on foot, he ends up traveling by a number of modes of transportation, including a long distance by bike. As he travels along, the author stays with local families. The book provides an interesting view into the Cuban economy, culture and people. Economically, the country appears to be a mess.

The author’s passions include bird watching, Cuban music and Caribbean religions. Consequently, you got a dose of those subjects sprinkled throughout the book.

I am intrigued by the idea of an epic journey. After running the 50 miler two years ago, I have been toying with the idea of a larger goal for the future. I am fascinated by the idea of doing a thru-hike on the Pacific Coast Trail from Mexico to Canada.

I really enjoyed the book. Nevertheless, with so many good books in the world, I would not recommend the book unless you have a specific interest in Cuba.

During May, I finished reading A Talent for War by Jack McDevitt. This is the first book of a series that take places in the same world with the same main characters (Alex Benedict and Chase Kolpath). Seeker, the third book in the series, won the 2006 Nebula award for best novel.

This science fiction novel is set in the distant future with humanity spread amongst the stars. Several hundred years before the time of the novel a war was fought against an alien species. The plot revolves around historical research trying to untangle the events of the war. The passage of time and the confusion of war create disinformation and confusion. Essentially, the novel is a historical puzzle with a number of interesting plots twists.

I give the book a lukewarm recommendation. There are parts of the books where the pacing is very good that I really enjoyed, but there were other parts that seemed to drag. The underlying puzzle is strong enough that it pulled me along and kept me interested until the end.

I finished reading the The Associate by John Grisham. Since June of 1993, I have read 22 books by Grisham; As I have said before, I am not sure that this is something that I should be proud of.

Part of the storyline includes an interesting look at what it might be like to work for one of the largest law firms in the world. In particular, it details how the main character is treated and used as a first year associate straight out of law school.

Some of the reviews of the book have criticized the ending. Although I initially furrowed my brow as I finished the book, the ending seems consistent with the story as I have thought about the book over the last couple of days.

I enjoyed the book more than some of Grisham’s other fiction of the last few years. I recommend it as a fast read for light entertainment.

Several months ago, there was a segment on the NPR Books podcast about Tony Hillerman. Hillerman died late last year. He wrote wrote more than 30 books total including 18 books in his Navajo mystery series. I was intrigued by the podcast and brought Dance Hall Of The Dead which received the 1973 Edgar Award for Best Novel. I finished reading the book earlier in May.

Dance Hall Of The Dead is the second of the Navajo Tribal Police series of crime fiction novels. It is centered around the character of police Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn on the Navajo Reservation in the Four Corners region of the American Southwest. Themes of the book include the Zuni religion and hostility between the Navajo and the Zuni.

We had a chance to spend some time in Northern New Mexico in 2007. I always enjoy reading books set in places I have actually been.

I enjoyed Dance Hall of the Dead immensely. I liked reading style and the pacing of the book. I will eventually pick up another of Hillerman’s books to read.

I finished reading the John F. Kennedy biography, An Unfinished Life. I was six years old when Kennedy as assassinated. I can remember walking down a hallway at Woodrow Wilson Elementary and hearing two teachers talking about Kennedy being killed; I would have been in first grade. Reading this book and the Joe Kennedy biography Sins of the Father, I realize that my knowledge of the both the Kennedy family in general and JFK in particular was pretty superficial.

In just three years of the JFK presidency, an amazing amount of things happened. Some of the events included: the Bay of Pigs; the Berlin Crisis with the erection of the Berlin Wall; a crisis in Laos; an increase in the number of American military personnel in South Vietnam to 16,000, up from Eisenhower’s 900 advisors; the overthrow and assassination of South Vietnamese Premier Ngo Dinh Diem; formation of the Peace Crops; the first Nuclear Test Ban Treaty; the Cuban Missile Crisis; setting a course for a moon landing before the end of the decade, a battle with steel producers over price increases and a number of civil rights crises including Birmingham and the Freedom Riders. Due to the opportunities provided by his father’s position and wealth, JFK was in some ways uniquely qualified to deal with many of the international issues that he faced.

I never realized the number of health problems that John Kennedy faced over the course of his life. Conversely, I was aware of JFK’s reputation as a womanizer. It is amazing that his sex life was largely unreported by the mainstream press.

Although it is not the best biography I have read, I recommend the book. From my perspective, the book’s weakness is that it tends to get bogged down in detail in some sections. The book adds to my desire to find a biography on J. Edgar Hoover and peaks my interest in reading more about Robert Kennedy.

In March, I finished reading Thirteen by Richard K. Morgan. Over the last three and a half year, I have read three other of Morgan’s books, including Altered Carbon, Broken Angels and Market Forces.

Set in the early 22nd Century, the plot includes a very different world geo-political landscape; the United States is divided into three different countries. Mars is being terraformed and settled. During the late 21st century, genetic engineering created a number of different specialized humans. The main character, a Thirteen, is a genetically engineered solider.

Thirteen started slow, but then pulled me in. About 200 pages into the book, someone asked me about the story and I described it as a detective story set in the future. Then about 350 pages into the 550 page book, the story rolled through and past what I thought was going to be the ending. While it remains in part a detective story, on another level it uses the story to comment on society based on how society reacts to the genetically engineered humans.

I am always looking for interesting ideas in books. At one point in the story, the main character talks about “eleven things that I wanted to do at some point in what was left of my life.” Essentially, some larger goals to drive him forward. I like this idea.

Overall, I give the book a lukewarm recommendation: interesting, but not great. Of Morgan’s four books that I have read, I recommend Altered Carbon as the best.

Over the last several months, we have seen the author of American Lion on the Jon Steward Show and the Colbert Report. I was impressed with the author (he is an editor for Newsweek) and I bought the book. About halfway through, I was ready to dump the book and give it a negative recommendation. Although I am sure that it is not true, it seems like the majority of the first half of the book deal with Jackson’s War Secretary John Eaton and his wife Margaret and their struggles to be accepted by Washington society. It seemed like this subject when on and on.

About the time I was really discouraged, the book shifted gears and started to focus on a number of key events, including the South Carolina nullification efforts, Jackson’s crusade against the Bank of the United States, tensions with France over a treaty, moving the Indians west of the Mississippi and the conflict between Texas and Mexico. I have not read much about American history from 1800 to 1840. I was fascinated by the how you could see lines being drawn for the Civil War more than 30 year before it took place. I enjoyed the second half of the book.

Overall, I give the book a luke warm recommendation. I am definitely going to have to go back later and find a complete biography on Andrew Jackson.

I finished reading Lethe by Tricia Sullivan. I bought this book from Amazon in March of 2002 (more than six years ago!) and it has been sitting in my pile of books to read ever since. I am making a conscious attempt to clear some of the older books out of pile. I was reading novels by several other female science fiction writers about this time and can only assume that there was a pointer to this novel.

Lethe is a post apocalyptic novel set in the second half of the twenty-second century [2160’s]. In this case, the worldwide disaster is a war with competing genetics corporations unleashing kill viruses. The corporations were also experimenting with genetically altering humans with a variety of results. The wide ranging plot includes collective intelligence among dolphins, mutant one-eyed humans that provide the labor force, a gateway on the fringe of the solar system to other parts of the universe, an alien planet and the integration of human brains into computer systems.

I generally prefer science fiction that focuses on technology, while this novel focuses more on biology and life sciences. It is a solid book. I enjoyed it, but it is not a book that I personally strongly recommend.