The Last 300 Books I’ve Read

As part of a never-ending series, I like to do short reviews of the books I read. Here are the latest 40 books I’ve read along with the previous 260 that I’ve perused included.

PS: If you’re wondering why there are very few low rated books on this list, it’s because I have a low tolerance for boredom and tend to just stop reading publications that don’t hold my interest. Sometimes I go back to them and sometimes I don’t.

PS #2: Some of these books were sent to me by publishers, gratis, because they were hoping I’d do reviews. I’m including that because I believe I now have to, legally, although I think that’s silly.

300) Richard Paul Evans: The Five Lessons a Millionaire Taught Me About Life and Wealth (B+: A really good book on finances and growing your income.)

299) Jim Rohn: Five Major Pieces to the Life Puzzle (B-: Not a bad book, but ultimately forgettable.)

298) Ken Blanchard & Sheldon Bowles: Raving Fans: A Revolutionary Approach To Customer Service (D+: A book that tries to get across a point in story form, but it fails on almost every level.)

297) Bill Buford: Among the Thugs (A+: This book about soccer hooligans is not only a gripping read, it gives amazing insight into the group dynamics of riots and crime.)

296) Daniel Coyle: The Talent Code: Greatness Isn’t Born. It’s Grown. Here’s How. (A-: If you doubt that genius is created by direct practice, not genetics, read this book and it will change your mind.)

295) Jillian Michaels: Master Your Metabolism: The 3 Diet Secrets to Naturally Balancing Your Hormones for a Hot and Healthy Body! (B: A bit simplistic and not as good as her previous work, but conceptually, the idea of steering clear of chemicals and eating whole foods is good advice.)

294) David Whitsett, Forrest Dolgener and Tanjala Kole: The Non-Runner’s Marathon Trainer (A: I’m running a half-marathon in September and I’ve weaved a lot of the information I learned here into my training.)

293) Cass Sunstein: Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness (B: The general idea here is that relatively small shifts in the way issues are framed can have surprisingly large impacts on behavior. Interesting concept, although in the hands of people like Sunstein with fascistic tendencies, it’s clear the information in the book isn’t always going to be used for the good.)

292) Doug McGuff: Body by Science: A Research Based Program for Strength Training, Body building, and Complete Fitness in 12 Minutes a Week (C: It’s not that this book on high intensity training is bad, it’s that it doesn’t add much to what’s available online.)

291) R.A. Salvatore: Gauntlgrym: Neverwinter Saga, Book I (C+: Simply not on the same level as the earlier books in the Drizzt Do’Urden series.)

290) Doug Mauss & Sergio Cariello: The Action Bible (A: The Bible in graphic novel format. This is a FANTASTIC read. I’ve already recommended it to people looking to learn more about Christianity because it’s such a fun, easy read.)

289) Stuart Wilde: Silent Power (C+: A short self-help book. Very readable, but didn’t take that much away from it.)

288) Joe Navarro & Marvin Karlins: What Every BODY is Saying: An Ex-FBI Agent’s Guide to Speed-Reading People (B: Solid book on body language, but pretty dry.)

287) Max Brooks: The Zombie Survival Guide: Recorded Attacks (C: A graphic novel that plays on the World War Z theme. Nice idea, but it’s a little short and the execution is lacking.)

286) Jilian Michaels: Unlimited: A Three-Step Plan for Achieving Your Dreams (A-: I was a little surprised at how sophisticated this book is. Jillian Michaels brings more to the table than I expected. This is genuinely a good self-help book.)

285) Stu Mittleman: Slow Burn: Burn Fat Faster By Exercising Slower (A: This book is a must read for runners or anyone who wants to exercise to lose weight.)

284) Ann Coulter: Never Trust a Liberal Over 3-Especially a Republican (B-: It’s not really fair for me to grade the books Ann puts out that are mainly comprised of all of her old columns because I read everything she does. So, even though it’s very well written, none of it’s fresh to me.)

283) Walter Isaacson: Steve Jobs (A-: This was a great autobiography. It really captured Steve Jobs, who’s a complicated character. One part driven genius, one part a-hole.)

282) Brian Tracy: Eat That Frog!: 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time (B: This book is easier reading than most of Brian Tracy’s work, but isn’t quite as packed with excellent info. Solid, but not spectacular.)

281) Marty Weintraub: Killer Facebook Ads: Master Cutting-Edge Facebook Advertising Techniques (C-: Granted, I already know a lot about Facebook, but I didn’t get much out of this book. I’m not even sure it would be worth it for novices.)

280) Ann Coulter: Mugged: Racial Demagoguery from the Seventies to Obama (A-: Coulter is a great writer and a superb researcher; so all of her books that feature original content are consistently excellent. This one is no different.)

279) Peter Menzel: What I Eat: Around the World in 80 Diets (A-: This is more of a coffee table book, but it’s still a great read. It is surprisingly entertaining to see what people all across the world are : eating laid out right in front of you.)

278) F. Batmanghelidj: Your Body’s Many Cries for Water (A: A book on water SOUNDS really boring, but this is much more compelling than you’d think. Although the author oversells the benefits of water a bit, there’s actually a lot to learn from this book. In fact, I started drinking 1.25 gallons of water per day exclusively after reading this book.)

277) James O’Keefe: Breakthrough: Our Guerilla War to Expose Fraud and Save Democracy (A: I was a little surprised that this is so good since O’Keefe is known for videos, not writing. O’Keefe’s career has been both inspirational and educational.)

276) Max Brooks: World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War (A: This book tries to do a “realistic” depiction of what would happen if zombies really existed. It’s a great read and completely different from the movie.)

275) Martha Stout: The Sociopath Next Door (B+: You probably know sociopaths right now. You should read this book and learn how to deal with them.)

274) Tom Connellan: The 1% Solution for Work and Life: How to Make Your Next 30 Days the Best Ever (B: The general idea is that consistent small improvements really add up. It’s the same idea as the “The Compound Effect,” but not as good.)

273) Greg Gutfeld: The Joy of Hate: How to Triumph over Whiners in the Age of Phony Outrage (A: Gutfeld isn’t just funny, he’s an excellent writer and a surprisingly profound thinker.)

272) Richard Wiseman: 59 Seconds: Change Your Life in Under a Minute (B-: A science-based self-help book. Has some interesting research in it, but too many disparate topics covered quickly ultimately makes it forgettable.)

271) Victor Davis Hanson: The Father of Us All: War and History, Ancient and Modern (B: Hanson makes history come alive. Good, but definitely not his best book.)

270) Joss Whedon: Tales of the Slayers (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) (B-: Short, but fun and readable for Buffy fans.)

269) Sasha Isenberg: The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns (A: This is a book on the science of winning elections and if there’s a Republican politician or political operative who hasn’t read it yet, he needs to get cracking.)

268) Paulo Cohelo: The Alchemist (B+: An extremely well written book about achieving your full potential disguised as a fairy tale.)

267) Richard Bandler: An Insiders Guide to Sub Modalities (B-: The book has some good information in it, but like most books about Neuro-Linguistic Programming, it’s very dry reading.)

266) Steve Chandler: Reinventing Yourself: How To Become The Person You’ve Always Wanted To Be (B+: Excellent self-help book, but not quite extraordinary enough to merit an “A.”)

265) Eric Hoffer: First Things, Last Things (B-: This is Eric Hoffer doing what he does best: talking about philosophy and why people do what they do. It isn’t one of his better books and people who aren’t rabid Hoffer fans would probably be better off reading something else.)

264) John Eldredge: Wild at Heart Revised & Updated: Discovering the Secret of a Man’s Soul (B: A book on discovering your “wild side” as a man. Well done, but it’s a pretty simple theme.)

263) David Bach: Start Late, Finish Rich: A No-Fail Plan for Achieving Financial Freedom at Any Age (Finish Rich Book Series) (B: A solid, but not spectacular book on how to manage your finances.)

262) Pete Earley: Crazy: A Father’s Search Through America’s Mental Health Madness (B: This has a lot of great information in it about how we handle mental illness in this country. The one weak spot is that the father looks at people : victimized in a fit of madness as the bad guys instead of victims of his son’s behavior.)

261) Helen Smith: Men on Strike: Why Men Are Boycotting Marriage, Fatherhood, and the American Dream – and Why It Matters (A-: A superb book about how modern men are being abused by feminism.)

260) Nancy Etcoff: Survival of the Prettiest: The Science of Beauty (A: Looks aren’t everything, but they make a much, much bigger difference than you may realize. The studies prove it and Nancy Etcoff, who is an excellent writer, went into great depth on the subject)

259) Chuck Liddell: Iceman: My Fighting Life (B: It was a good read, entertaining, and even a little inspirational)

258) Karen Pryor: Don’t Shoot the Dog!: The New Art of Teaching and Training (A-: Despite the name, this is a book about how to change human behavior with conditioning and behaviorism. It’s excellent.)

257) Daron Acemoglu, James Robinson: Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty (A-: A well thought-out book that does an excellent job of explaining a very weighty and controversial matter in a systematic way).

256) G. K. Chesterton: The Man Who Was Thursday (C-: Chesterton was a brilliant guy and I had heard good things about the book. However, even though it was cleverly written, it wasn’t very good. I was very disappointed.)

255) Steve Chandler: 100 Ways to Motivate Yourself: Change Your Life Forever (B+: I’d read this book long ago and had forgotten it, so this is a reread. That being said, there actually are a few really useful concepts from the book that I had liked and implemented. All in all, it’s a good book, although it felt like he just tossed a few in there at the end to pad it out to 100)

254) Dr. Henry Cloud: Integrity: The Courage to Meet the Demands of Reality (B+: I took a flier on this one and it turned out to be a very good book about improving yourself as a human being.)

253) Gordon Patzer: Looks: Why They Matter More Than You Ever Imagined (B: A solid book with lots of freaky study results that show how you look matters much more than most people ever realize.)

252) Malcolm Gladwell: Outliers: The Story of Success (B-: As per usual with Gladwell, it was very readable and interesting, but after you’re done, you’re left scratching your head when you try to figure out how to apply anything in the book.)

251) Steve Andreas, Charles Faulkner: NLP: The New Technology of Achievement (B-: Good information, but as per usual with most books about NLP, very, very dry.)

250) Seth Godin: Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us (B+: Like all of Godin’s books, this is short, well written, with great info, but you’re always left wanting just a little bit more practical advice.)

249) Forrest Griffin: Got Fight?: The 50 Zen Principles of Hand-to-Face Combat (A-: Despite the title, you’re probably not going to learn anything about fighting by reading this book. You will, however, laugh. A lot)

248) Justin Halpern: Sh*t My Dad Says (A-: The TV show may have bombed, but this is one funny book.)

247) Malachi Martin: Hostage to the Devil: The Possession and Exorcism of Five Contemporary Americans (B+: It’s hard to know how much credence to give to this, but it’s a scary, disturbing book.)

246) Jonah Goldberg: The Tyranny of Cliches: How Liberals Cheat in the War of Ideas (A-: Yet another well thought, well written book with lots of original thinking from Goldberg.)

245) John Casti: X-Events: The Collapse of Everything (B+: This very well done book keys you in to all sorts of potential disasters that you may never have considered before.)

244) Peter H. Diamandis and Steven Kotler: Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think (B+: This is a good book that will open your mind to some of the amazing technical advances we’re likely to see in the next few decades.)

243) Mark Singer: Citizen K: The Deeply Weird American Journey of Brett Kimberlin (B-: A great book if you want to read about now notorious criminal, Brett Kimberlin. Otherwise, it’s still perversely fascinating to learn what he managed to get away with, but the book isn’t as gripping)

242) Charles Duhgigg: The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business (A-: There’s a lot of good information in this book about making and breaking habits.)

241) Stephen Lankton: Practical Magic:: A Translation of Basic Neuro-Linguistic Programming Into Clinical Psychotherapy (B-: NLP is an absolutely fascinating subject, but other than Anthony Robbins, few people seem to be able to write about it well enough to hold your attention. Unfortunately, this book is no exception. Pretty good info, but kind of dull.)

240) Al Ries & Jack Trout: Bottom-up Marketing (Plume) (B+: An excellent book on marketing, but it covers a lot of the same ground as their previous books.)

239) David Horowitz: Left Illusions: An Intellectual Odyssey (B: A good book, but it rehashes some of Horowitz’s older work)

238) Robert Leckie: From Sea To Shining Sea: From the War of 1812 to the Mexican War, the Saga of America’s Expansion (A: Leckie is consistently excellent. Nobody does history better).

237) Anthony DeStefano: Ten Prayers God Always Says Yes To: Divine Answers to Life’s Most Difficult Problems (A-: I would unhesitatingly recommend this book to any Christian)

236) Steve Siebold: Die Fat or Get Tough: 101 Differences in Thinking Between Fat People and Fit People (A: One of the best books on the mentality you need to lose weight that I’ve ever read.)

235) Dawn Eden: My Peace I Give You: Healing Sexual Wounds with the Help of the Saints (B: My friend Dawn Eden sent me this book. If you’ve ever been sexually assaulted or molested, this is probably a book that would help you a lot.)

234) Ben Thompson: Badass: The Birth of a Legend: Spine-Crushing Tales of the Most Merciless Gods, Monsters, Heroes, Villains, and Mythical Creatures Ever Envisioned (B: Not as good as Thompson’s first book, but it’s still a fun read.)

233) 50 Cent & Kris Ex: From Pieces to Weight: Once Upon a Time in Southside Queens (B+. This is a surprisingly good book that mostly focuses on 50 Cent’s time as a drug dealer and the beginning of his career as a rapper. It keeps you riveted)

232) Thomas Sowell: The Quest for Cosmic Justice (A-: Sowell is consistently excellent and this book is par for the course.)

231) Charles Murray: Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010 (A-: This book about the huge gap that has developed between the elites and the lower class in America has been much talked about with good reason. It’s a fascinating book.)

230) Daniel Pink: Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us (B-: A solid, but not spectacular book on what motivates people)

229) Mark Levin: Ameritopia: The Unmaking of America (B+: Good, solid book that goes very deep into the roots of Utopianiasm.)

228) Henry David Thoreau: Walden; Or, Life in the Woods (Dover Thrift Editions) (B-: This book is a classic and although it has some interesting parts, there’s a whole lot of dull, too.)

227) Bob Burg, John David Mann: The Go-Giver: A Little Story About a Powerful Business Idea (B+: An excellent book about the impact giving can have on your life)

226) Roy F. Baumeister, Aaron Beck Evil: Inside Human Violence and Cruelty (A-: An excellent book on the true, more complex nature of evil.

225) Charles Fishman: The Wal-Mart Effect: How the World’s Most Powerful Company Really Works–and How It’s Transforming the American Economy (B: It’s a leftward leaning book, but only slightly so and it has an amazing array of fascinating information about Wal-Mart in it.)

224) Darren Hardy: The Compound Effect (A: The book is short, to the point, and will change your life if you read it, absorb it, and live it.)

223) Tim Jeal: Stanley: The Impossible Life of Africa’s Greatest Explorer (B: Morton Stanley went through trials that seem almost unimaginable today in order to explore Africa. Finding out about them made it a good read.)

222) Fulton J. Sheen: Peace of Soul (A: This book is practically a must read for Christians.)

221) Roy F. Baumeister, John Tierney: Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength (A: This is a revolutionary book on willpower. Much recommended.)

220) Marc Levinson: The Box: How the Shipping Container Made the World Smaller and the World Economy Bigger (B+: This was a great book that will teach you a tremendous amount about trade, but it is also VERY MUCH a niche subject. This book isn’t for everyone.)

219) Lionel Tiger: The Decline of Males: The First Look at an Unexpected New World for Men and Women (B: Solid book about the changing conditions between men and women in the modern era. Not a pro-male book so much as a matter of fact description of the world as it is now.)

218) Helen Fisher: Why Him? Why Her?: Finding Real Love By Understanding Your Personality Type (A: Outstanding book and I found the personality system in it to be particularly useful because it’s fairly easy to categorize people in it.)

217) Markos Moulitsas Zuniga: Taking on the System: Rules for Change in a Digital Era (B: This is sort of an attempt to write a modern day version of Alinsky’s “Rules for Radicals.” I don’t agree with the politics, but it is an interesting book.)

216) Robert Putnam: Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community (A-: This is an outstanding book about a declining sense of American community, but it’s a bit of a niche subject.)

215) Leigh Burke: Niche Internet Marketing: The Secrets To Exploiting Untapped Niche Markets And Unleashing A Tsunami Of Cash (C+: It’s tough to find good books on this subject.)

214) Mark Steyn: After America: Get Ready for Armageddon (A+: I can’t say enough good things about this book. I wish every American could read it to see where this country is headed unless we change course.)

213) Marc Ostrofsky: Get Rich Click!: The Ultimate Guide to Making Money on the Internet (B-: How to make money on the Internet. I got some ideas out of it.)

212) Robert Leckie: George Washington’s War: The Saga of the American Revolution (A-: Leckie makes history come alive and if you want to understand the American Revolution, you couldn’t do any better than this book.)

211) Laura Vanderkam: 168 Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think (B+: This was an excellent book on time management. Highly recommended)

210) Russell Brand: My Booky Wook: A Memoir of Sex, Drugs, and Stand-Up: (B+: This was a surprising, readable, attention-holding book because Brand had a train wreck of a life, where he did almost everything wrong and somehow, someway, ended up being successful in spite of it.)

209) Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, Les Hewitt: The Power of Focus: How to Hit Your Business, Personal, And Financial Targets With Absolute Certainty: (A-: This is a good book for people who’ve already read some self-help books and are looking for a little extra organization of their life and goals.)

208) Jeff Galloway: Running Until You’re 100: (B: I’m a newb to running; so it wasn’t hard for me to learn a few things from the book.)

207) Sidney Rosen: My Voice Will Go with You: The Teaching Tales of Milton H. Erickson : (C-: I was interested in learning more about Milton Erickson’s techniques and what I came to realize is that a lot of what Erickson told his students was BS designed to enhance his reputation, rather than improve their understanding.)

206) Stephen King: Full Dark, No Stars: (B+: King used to be one of my favorite authors, but the quality of his work had seemed to slip. I was in an airport, in the mood for some horror and gave him another shot. Turns out, this book of semi-short stories was good stuff.)

205) Ann Coulter: Demonic: How the Liberal Mob Is Endangering America: (A: If it’s Coulter and it’s new material, it’s guaranteed to be spectacular. This book was, just as expected.)

204) Correction to follow

203) Maribeth Meyers-Anderson: Phoenix: Therapeutic Patterns of Milton H. Erickson: (C: I was fascinated with Erickson’s therapeutic techniques, but my conclusion after reading this book was that Erickson may indeed by brilliant, but a lot of the stories he was telling his students were tall tales designed to enhance his reputation.)

202) Donald McCrory: No Ordinary Man: The Life and Times of Miguel de Cervantes: (B: This was a well written Cervantes biography — and he had a heck of a life — although I’m not sure this book would be most people’s cup of tea.)

201) Warren Farrell: The Myth of Male Power: (B: This book’s good, but not in the same class as Farrell’s master work “Why Men Are the Way They Are.”)

200) Richard Dawkins: The Selfish Gene: (B: This book, which is very influential, has a fascinating and well reasoned take on how evolution may work. Unfortunately, Dawkins also manages to shoehorn a number of largely irrelevant atheistic arguments into the book that felt very out of place and poorly reasoned compared to the rest of the tome.)

199) Lyssie Lakatos & Tammy Lakatos Shames (Author)Fire Up Your Metabolism: 9 Proven Principles for Burning Fat and Losing Weight Forever: (B+: Metabolism is a surprisingly mysterious subject. This book had better info on it than anything else I’ve ever read and as an extra added bonus, the authors, who are twins, actually tested out the principles in the book with self-experimentation. It was a really nice addition to the book.)

198) Daniel Coleman: Vital Lies, Simple Truths: The Psychology of Self-Deception: (B+: Everybody lies to themselves sometimes and unfortunately, nobody is better at misleading you than you are at misleading yourself. This book covers the many different ways we trick ourselves.)

197) David Niven: 100 Simple Secrets of Healthy People: (C: It felt like Niven was reaching a little bit here to stick to his formula.)

196) David Niven: 100 Simple Secrets of Happy People, The: What Scientists Have Learned and How You Can Use It: (B: This is an excellent book, but I’ve seen a lot of it already. If I had read this 10 years ago, it would have probably gotten an A.)

195) Jim Loehr & Tony Schwartz: The Power of Full Engagement: Managing Energy, Not Time, Is the Key to High Performance and Personal Renewal: (B+: This has a simple concept behind it: Better to be focused with high energy on a few things than non-focused with low energy on a lot of things. It’s not so much the amount of time you put in as the quality of the time you put in. There’s more to it than that, but that’s the gist.)

194) Frank Farrelly: Provocative Therapy: (B: This is a book about a captivating style of therapy that you can also weave into conversation — or at least I can.)

193) Marc J. Seifer: Wizard: The Life and Times of Nikola Tesla: Biography of a Genius: (B: A detail heavy, intriguing and inspiring book about the life and times of Nikola Tesla. Tesla lived in a fascinating time for American science, but sadly his grandiosity and contract wrangling cost one of the most brilliant men of his time decades of scientific productivity.)

192) Knock Knock Books: Insults and Comebacks for All Occasions (Lines for All Occasions): (C+: Okay for what it was. Mean spirited jokes. Didn’t knock my socks off or anything.)

191) Jeffrey VanVonderen: Tired of Trying to Measure Up: Getting Free from the Demands, Expectations, and Intimidation of Well-Meaning People (B-: I read this because I’ve seen VanVonderen on Intervention and find him to be an impressive guy. The book had some interesting nuggets in it, but it didn’t blow me away. Of course, I’m not the target audience, so I may not be the best judge.)

190) Paul Ekman: Emotions Revealed, Second Edition: Recognizing Faces and Feelings to Improve Communication and Emotional Life (B: There’s some interesting info, particularly the parts that focused on micro-expressions, but it’s a fairly dry book.)

189) Richar Koch: The 80/20 Principle: The Secret to Achieving More with Less (C: The 80/20 principle is very useful, but the book really didn’t do all that much to help explain how to make use of it. It’s like he took a long essay about a useful subject and stretched it out into a book.)

188) Edmund Morgan: Benjamin Franklin (B-: Benjamin Franklin lived an amazing life and while Morgan’s biography taught me a lot about it, it wasn’t a great read and there could have been more details in certain places.)

187) Timothy Ferriss: The 4-Hour Body: An Uncommon Guide to Rapid Fat-Loss, Incredible Sex, and Becoming Superhuman (B: There’s a lot of absolutely fascinating data here, but in retrospect, much of it turned out be more of a curiosity than a useful addition.)

186) Al Ries and Jack Trout: Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind (B+: Another great book on marketing by Ries + Trout. There’s a lot of truth in it, especially in the Internet age, when every niche is crowded with an army of competitors.)

185) Paul Dobransky: The Secret Psychology of How We Fall in Love (B: Dobransky has a lot of insights, but the book is very complex. At times, it’s hard to get a handle on everything he’s saying and put it into perspective.)

184) Warren Farrell: Why Men Are the Way They Are (A: This is an extraordinary book — and it’s not an anti-female book either. But, it breaks down a lot of behaviors that have been created by the way men and women interact. I would call it allowing you to see the Matrix, except so much of it is out in the open anyway — we just miss it.)

183) Pietra Rivoli: The Travels of a T-Shirt in the Global Economy: An Economist Examines the Markets, Power, and Politics of World Trade (B+: This is a very good, very well written book about global trade — and those are actually fairly difficult to find.)

182) James Humes: Speak Like Churchill, Stand Like Lincoln: 21 Powerful Secrets of History’s Greatest Speakers (A-: If you do speeches, this is a book worth reading.)

181) P. J. O’Rourke: Don’t Vote It Just Encourages the Bastards (B+: Another outstanding book from P.J., who, when he’s on, is one of the best political writers you’re going to run across)

180) Al Ries and Laura Ries: The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding (A: Not as good #8 on the list, but not still the 2nd best book on Marketing that I’ve ever read)

179) Eric Hoffer: The Ordeal of Change: (B+: Another short, outstanding book by Hoffer. If you want to understand mass movements, nobody explains them better than Hoffer)

178) Al Ries and Jack Trout: The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing: Violate Them at Your Own Risk!: (A+: The best book on marketing that I’ve read. Period. Anybody who wants to do effective marketing should read this.)

177) Viktor Frankl: Man’s Search for Meaning: (A: Frankl explains the details of life in a Nazi Concentration Camp and how it impacts man’s search for the meaning of life. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend this book to anybody)

176) Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, David Maxfield, Ron McMillan, & Al Switzler (A: Influencer: The Power to Change Anything:: (B: They examine how change works in the real world and apply the lessons from people and organizations that have been successful.)

175) C.S. Lewis: Miracles: (B: A short book by Lewis pondering his agony after his wife passed. It’s a very sad, very moving book and as always with Lewis, you can’t help but learn something.)

174) Matt Ridley: The Red Queen: Sex and the Evolution of Human Nature: (B: I don’t believe in macroevolution, but I do believe in microevolution and I think Ridley has a good take on it. )

173) Jay Levinson: Guerrilla Marketing, 4th edition: Easy and Inexpensive Strategies for Making Big Profits from Your Small Business: (B-: I did learn some things from this book, but it’s surprisingly conventional for a book at that’s supposed to be about guerrilla marketing.)

172) Laura Ingraham: The Obama Diaries: (B-: Making up imaginary diaries for the Obama family was grating and it detracted from what Ingraham was saying.)

171) Milton Friedman: Money Mischief: Episodes in Monetary History: (B-: You can learn a lot about monetary policy from this book, but it’s very, very dry.)

170) Ben Thompson: Badass: A Relentless Onslaught of the Toughest Warlords, Vikings, Samurai, Pirates, Gunfighters, and Military Commanders to Ever Live (A-: This is NOT heavy reading, but it’s fun reading, it’s entertaining reading, and it’s MANLY reading.)

169) Bob Greene: Bob Greene’s Total Body Makeover: An Accelerated Program of Exercise and Nutrition for Maximum Results in Minimum Time (C-/D+: This is Oprah’s diet guru. Here’s the whole book in four words: “Exercise a whole lot.” Good advice? Yes. Did he need a whole book to tell you this? No.)

168) Robert Glover: No More Mr. Nice Guy!: (B+: For the man who wonders if being too nice a guy is holding him back. There’s some surprisingly good advice in this book — especially if you’re a nice guy.)

167) Jonathan Haidt: The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom (A-: This is a brilliant, insightful, and well researched book on happiness and let’s face it — who couldn’t use a little more happiness in his life?)

166) Dr. Drew Pinksy: The Mirror Effect: How Celebrity Narcissism Is Seducing America : (B: Pinsky is a smart, compassionate guy with a deep understanding of the dark side of human behavior — because he’s seen it all. His books are solid and very readable.

165) George Friedman: The Next 100 Years: A Forecast for the 21st Century (B: Analyzing geopolitics and forecasting how things will look for the next 100 years is a daunting, nearly impossible task, but Friedman takes an informed crack at it. Will the book even be mostly right? Probably not, but you learn a lot as Friedman explains the thinking behind his speculation)

164) James Surowiecki: The Wisdom of Crowds (A-: This is a brilliant, well researched book that will give you more faith in the wisdom of crowds and less faith in the proclamations of geniuses who are supposed to be smarter than everyone else.)

163) Thomas Stanley: Stop Acting Rich: …And Start Living Like A Real Millionaire (B-: The idea behind the book, that most of the rich actually got there by saving money and living frugal lifestyles is eye opening and backed up with lots of research. Unfortunately, Stanley really drags the book out by tediously recounting every detail of his research with whole chapters that could have been effectively summarized in a paragraph.)

162) Neil Strauss: Motley Crue: The Dirt – Confessions of the World’s Most Notorious Rock Band: (A: This book is mind blowing. The unbelievably trashy way the band members grew up, partying that would make Nero green with envy, and the ups AND downs of drug use from the band. The book keeps you riveted from start to finish.)

161) David Olgilvy: Ogilvy on Advertising (B: I learned a lot about advertising by reading this book, but it was more geared towards people in the industry rather than people just looking to beef up their knowledge level about ads)

160) Nikki Stone: When Turtles Fly: Secrets of Successful People Who Know How To Stick Their Necks Out (C+: The concept — learning the secrets of success from extremely successful people — was fantastic. In practice, however, Stone spent very little time talking to each super-achiever. The book was also a bit too “back to basics” although it had a few good nuggets in there.)

159) Jonah Goldberg: Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning (A-: An absolutely masterful piece of research. If Goldberg had gone with his normal witty writing style, instead of taking a more scholarly approach, this would undoubtedly be an A+ book)

158) Thomas Sowell: The Housing Boom and Bust (A: This book should be studied in future classrooms of college students when they read about this economic crisis. It’s well reasoned, explains things in details, and features Sowell’s clear, crisp writing style.)

157) Dan Ariely: Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions: (B-: It did feature some of the predictable ways that we human beings make irrational decisions, but it didn’t tie it all together that well and featured some irrationality of its own while coming up with suggestions to fix the problem.)

156) Eric Hoffer: The Passionate State of Mind: (B+: Aside from his raging atheism, Hoffer has a rare insight into what makes human beings tick. I always learn a lot from his relatively short books and this one was no exception.)

155) Amy Alkon: I See Rude People: One woman’s battle to beat some manners into impolite society (B: This is a fun read and Alkon makes some good points in her ferocious and entertaining battle against rudeness.)

154) John Robbins: Healthy at 100: The Scientifically Proven Secrets of the World’s Healthiest and Longest-Lived Peoples (B: The first part of the book features brilliant research on the longest lived societies on the planet. It covers what they’re eating, how they’re exercising, etc. It may be worth your time to get the book just for that. But, the 2nd half of the book is useless hippy crap that drags the A+ material all the way down to a B)

153) Eric Hoffer: The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements (A: This is a book anyone trying to build a movement in politics, or elsewhere, should read. It’s a fascinating take on how the whole thing works.)

152) C.S. Lewis: Miracles (B: Lewis is an extraordinary writer about all things spiritual and I definitely learned some things from reading this book. However, Lewis is at his weakest as a writer when he gets neck deep into theology — and there’s a lot of that in this book).

151) Barbara Oakley: Evil Genes: Why Rome Fell, Hitler Rose, Enron Failed, and My Sister Stole My Mother’s Boyfriend (B-: The book makes a very good case for the “nature” side of “nature vs. nurture,” but it doesn’t convince me that evil is primarily a function of genes.

150) William Shirer: The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany (A: An incredibly detailed, well written (but long) book detailing the Nazis.)

149) L. Michael Hall: Mind-lines: Lines For Changing Minds (B: This is an incredible book for getting rid of bad habits, but it is very, very dry and “sciencey.”

148) Nicole Wilde: Getting a Grip on Aggression Cases: Practical Considerations for Dog Trainers (D: The book spends a considerable amount of time talking about everything a dog trainer should do EXCEPT how they should handle dog aggression. Big disappointment.)

147) Randy Pausch: The Last Lecture (A-: There are better motivational books out there, but this one really sticks with you because it was written as Pausch was dying)

146) David M. Kiely and Christina McKenna: The Dark Sacrament: True Stories of Modern-Day Demon Possession and Exorcism (A-: It’s very hard to tell how much stock should be put into the stories in this book. But either way, it’s VERY creepy.)

145) Michael Gerber: The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don’t Work and What to Do About It (A-: This book should be mandatory reading for all small business owners. I certainly learned a lot from it)

144) Tom Butler-Bowdon: 50 Prosperity Classics: Attract It, Create It, Manage It, Share It (A+: This was the best book on handling money I have ever read — perhaps because it takes the “best of” from so many other classic books)

143) Richard Brodie: Virus of the Mind: The New Science of the Meme (C+: I don’t consider memetics to be a science. It’s just a new way of looking at how information spreads. There are some nuggets in here, but it didn’t blow me away)

142) Robert Ringer: Million Dollar Habits (B-: Not one of Ringer’s better books. It feels like some of the material is just rehashed from his other books)

141) Robert Young: The pH Miracle: Balance Your Diet, Reclaim Your Health (?: It’s hard to rate this book. The writer is credible. The info he gives is amazing. I am not sure whether to buy into it. The one thing I did try from the book, PH Drops, made me throw up.)

140) Brian Tracy: Maximum Achievement: Strategies and Skills That Will Unlock Your Hidden Powers to Succeed (B: The book is packed with great info, but I find Tracy to be a very dull writer. That makes his books less enjoyable)

139) Chin-Ning Chu: Thick Face, Black Heart: The Warrior Philosophy for Conquering the Challenges of Business and Life (A-: An excellent self-help book with more on an Eastern slant. See the “best of” quotes from the book here.)

138) Jack Cashill: What’s the Matter with California?: Cultural Rumbles from the Golden State and Why the Rest of Us Should Be Shaking (B+: A very readable book that gives you a good backgrounder and why California is such a horrific mess.)

137) Al Ries & Laura Ries: The Fall of Advertising and the Rise of PR (B+: Lots of practical marketing advice and a different way of viewing advertising. In general, I think they’re right that PR is more effective than advertising)

136) Ann Coulter Guilty: Liberal “Victims” and Their Assault on America (A-: Every book of Ann’s that I have read, other than her first one and her “best of” books, has been outstanding and this one is no exception.

135) C.S. Lewis: The Screwtape Letters: How a Senior Devil Instructs a Junior Devil in the Art of Temptation (A+: One of the best books on Christianity that I have ever read. Despite the fact that it was written almost 70 years ago, it covers a number of topics better than almost anybody does today – and it’s all written in an engaging style that keeps you turning the pages.)
134) Timothy Ferriss: The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich (A-: This book is a thorough guide to living a certain type of lifestyle. It’s not a lifestyle I’m interested in, but the tips in it about how to minimize hassles and eliminate distractions in your life are invaluable)

133) Ori Brafman and Rom Brafman: Sway: The Irresistible Pull of Irrational Behavior (C: Another hot, well written, marketing book that gives you tons of fascinating, completely inapplicable information.)

132) Paul Babiak and Robert D. Hare: Snakes in Suits: When Psychopaths Go to Work (D: Very dry in places and in large chunks of the book, it comes across like it’s specifically written for human resources managers at large companies.)
131) Malcolm Gladwell: Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking (C: It’s an intriguing, well written read, but after reading it, it’s hard to see how to apply it – and a marketing book without any application leaves something to be desired.)

130) Drew Pinsky: Cracked: Putting Broken Lives Together Again (B: I read this because I liked Pinksy’s show, Sober House. The book covers a lot of the same ground, but with regular people. Anybody advocating legalizing drugs should read this book first.)

129) Alan Loy McGinnis: The Friendship Factor: How to Get Closer to the People You Care for (B-: It was a little basic in places, but overall was a good read that had a few good tips in it.)

128) Thomas Sowell: Applied Economics: Thinking Beyond Stage One (A-: This was a reread for me that I wanted to take another look at as prep for myinterview with Sowell. Nobody, Milton Friedman included, is better at writing about economics than Sowell and this was typical of his excellent work.)

127) Seth Godin: Purple Cow: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable(A-: It’s a short book that pushes a single, simple concept, but it did impact my thinking and I’d recommend it to any blogger or small business owner.)

126) Helen Fisher: Anatomy of Love: A Natural History of Mating, Marriage, and Why We Stray (B: Looking at love from a chemical and evolutionary perspective. It’s a touch dry and overly intellectualized in places, but good overall if you like reading about this sort of thing – and I do.)

125) John Brady: Bad Boy: The Life And Politics Of Lee Atwater (A: A gripping must-read for political junkies. There is a lot Republicans can learn from Atwater. Good luck finding a reasonably priced copy though.)

124) Drew Goddard & Joss Whedon: Wolves at the Gate (Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight, Volume 3): (B-: Fairly entertaining, but the plot and character development were rather thin. Too much comic book, not enough of the depth that helped make the show a classic.)

123) Seth Godin: The Dip: A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit (and When to Stick): (B+: It’s a short, well written book that hammers home a simple, but important organizational concept for high achievers.)
122) John Maxwell: Today Matters: 12 Daily Practices to Guarantee Tomorrow’s Success: (B+: Maxwell deserves a lot of credit. He churns out well organized, first rate material in a field where it has all been said before).
121) Malcolm Gladwell: The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference: (B+: A fascinating book on marketing that would’ve been better if it had talked more about how to reach the tipping point.)
120) Tom Butler-Bowdon: 50 Self-Help Classics: 50 Inspirational Books to Transform Your Life: (B+: Boiling down all these classic self-help books into one tome is a great concept, but some of the selections left something to be desired.)

119) Brian K. Vaughan & Joss Whedon: No Future For You (Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight, Volume 2): (B: Engaging and entertaining for Buffy fans, but not wholly satisfying).

118) Lincoln Child: The Deep Storm: (B+: Engaging fiction with a wicked twist at the end.)

117) John Maxwell: Leadership Gold: Lessons I’ve Learned from a Lifetime of Leading: (A-: One of the better self-help books I have read in a while.)

116) Robert Hare: Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of the Psychopaths Among Us: (B+: If you want to really understand psychopathic behavior, this is the book to read.)

115) Scott Peck: People of the Lie: The Hope for Healing Human Evil: (B: The first half was riveting, A+ material, but the 2nd half of the book was kind of lame.

114) Atul Gawande: Better – A surgeon’s notes on performance: (B: A decent book, written in the same style as “Complications” but wasn’t quite as good.)

113) Robert Kirkman and Sean Phillips: Marvel Zombies (A: What if all the Marvel super-heroes became zombies and started eating everybody else? This graphic novel covered it and covered it an entertaining manner. A fast, fun read)

112) Diablo Cody: Candy Girl: A Year in the Life of an Unlikely Stripper (A: Cody is a phenomenal writer and she deglamorizes stripping, unintentionally, in a way that keeps you reading. It was a fun read.)

111) Joss Whedon: Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Long Way Home (B+: The first part of the non-existant Season 8, in graphic novel form. Excellent, but it just seemed too short.)

110) Jayne Ann Krentz: Dangerous Men and Adventurous Women: Romance Writers on the Appeal of the Romance (B: I’ve never read a romance novel, but found this book on the psychology of how they work to be really interesting – not “A” level interesting, but interesting.)

109) Robert Ringer: Action!: Nothing Happens Until Something Moves (B: Excellent book, but it still gets a “B” because Ringer has written even better books)

108) Les Giblin: Skill With People (B+: Very short, but very good info. This was a reread for me.)

107) David Deida: The Way Of The Superior Man: A Spiritual Guide to Mastering the Challenges of Woman, Work, and Sexual Desire (B+: Way too much hippy-dippy material, but there were so many unique and useful ways of thinking about things in this book, I thought it deserved a B+ anyway)

106) Barbara and Allan Pease: Why Men Don’t Listen and Women Can’t Read Maps: How We’re Different and What to Do About It (B: A little dry in places, but it has a lot of great info about how men and women are different.)

105) Jack Canfield: The Success Principles(TM): How to Get from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be (A: Very good self-improvement book. One of the best I have read in a long while.)

104) Marci Shimoff: Happy for No Reason: 7 Steps to Being Happy from the Inside Out (B+: A lot of good info, but a little too hippy-dippy for me.)

103) Dawn Eden: The Thrill of the Chaste (A: A surprisingly readable, deep, personal, and spiritual book. One of the best books I’ve read in a while and something you want your teenagers reading)

102) Dexter Yager & Ron Ball: Everything I Know At The Top I Learned At The Bottom (B: Short and solid, but not spectacular compared to his best work)

101) Chris Jones: The Ecomancer: (A-: Excellent, conservative themed apocalyptic fiction. This would actually make a great movie – Former RWN advertiser)

100) Bill Newman: Soaring with Eagles: Principles of Success (A-: A small, inspiration book that reminds me a lot of Rhinoceros Success, which is a classic motivational book)
99) Thomas Sowell *****************

98) Dexter Yeager: Dynamic People Skills (A-: Yeager is a rich, successful guy and the book is a great read, although it focuses more on life skills than people skills per se)

97) Patrick Buchanan: The Death of the West: How Dying Populations and Immigrant Invasions Imperil Our Country and Civilization (A: I’m generally not much of a Buchanan fan, but the demographic and cultural arguments he puts forth in this book are well written, convincing, and more than a little scary)

96) Peter Haugen: World History for Dummies (B: The “For Dummies” series books tend to be very uneven in quality, especially when they’re covering broad topics. However, this is a good one. It does a great job of keeping it interesting although it seems a little shallow in places, which is, of course, unavoidable when you’re covering the history of the world in less than 400 pages)

95) Jean Raspail: The Camp Of The Saints (A: This riveting, fictional book describes the collapse of Western society after it’s inundated with hordes of unwanted immigrants. It’s a hell of a good story and it’s surprisingly how much of the book you can see unfolding in the world today)

94) Peter Heather: The Fall Of The Roman Empire (A-: The book does a particularly good job of coherently explaining the conditions that led to the collapse of the Roman Empire while keeping you from getting bored)

93) Stanley Coren: How Dogs Think: What the World Looks Like to Them and Why They Act the Way They Do (B: Parts of the book are a little too dry and “sciencey” for me, but there is some fantastic info in this book, too)
92) Rick Warren: The Power To Change Your Life (B: This is a short book written in Rick Warren’s self-help-book-meets-Christian book style. It’s no Purpose Drive Life, but then how many books are?)
91) Neal Boortz: The Terrible Truth About Liberals (B-: This is a short book with some decent insights in it)

90) Brian Lynch & Franco Urru: Spike: Asylum (C-: This is another “Buffyverse” graphic novel, but unfortunately, it’s not a very good one)

89) Joss Whedon: Fray (A-: This is a graphic novel from the same guy who’s behind Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It’s a tale of another slayer from the future and it’s good)

88) Ian Coburn: God is a Woman: Dating Disasters (A: This is a funny book from comedian Ian Coburn about his dating experiences – mostly the bad ones. It definitely keeps you laughing and every so often, you get a little bit of good advice to boot)

87) Cesar Millan: Be The Pack Leader (B-: This was readable, but bizarrely, most of the info that diehard “Dog Whisperer” fans will want to see, about dealing with the nitty gritty of dog behavior, is contained in an appendix)

86) Clarence Thomas: My Grandfather’s Son (A-: This reminds me of David Horowitz’s Radical Son. It kept me locked in and paying attention from beginning to end)

85) Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child: The Book of the Dead (C: This is a mystery/crime novel with some interesting elements, but there were several people who were so super-humanly competent that it made it impossible to suspend disbelief and just enjoy the story).

84) Atul Gawande: Complications: A Surgeon’s Notes on an Imperfect Science (B: A very readable, somewhat frightening book from a surgeon who goes to great lengths to explain how very fallible doctors really are)

83) Rick Warren: The Purpose Driven Life (A+: Without hesitation, I would recommend this book to any Christian over anything else I have ever read on Christianity outside of the Bible).

82) Alan Moore: Watchmen (A-: A gripping graphic novel that imagines all too human costumed crime fighters in a world that they gradually tilt off kilter.)

81) Thomas E. Woods Jr.: 33 Questions About American History You’re Not Supposed to Ask (C+: Informative, but a bit dry and overly concerned with minutiae at times)

80) Bob Novak: The Prince of Darkness: 50 Years Reporting in Washington(B+: I really enjoyed the book, which covers Novak’s 50 years of reporting in Washington, which mostly seemed to consist of meeting important people for lunch, getting info out of them over drinks, and reporting it in his column. However, I am a blogger and a hardcore political junky. If that definition doesn’t fit you as well, you may not enjoy the book nearly as much as I did.)

79) Drew Curtis: It’s Not News, It’s Fark: How Mass Media Tries to Pass Off Crap As News (A-: I thought this was a funny, extremely effective, non-partisan critique of the mainstream media. It was rather enjoyable.)

78) Michael Moorcock: The Weird of the White Wolf 3 (A+: This is book 3 in what I consider to be the best fantasy series of all-time and I wanted to reread it to see if it was as good as I thought it was. It was:…)

77) Col David Hunt: On the Hunt: How to Wake Up Washington and Win the War on Terror (C: While Hunt definitely scores some points and says some things of interest, he complains so incessantly, about almost everything related to the war on terror, that his complaints come across as contradicting each other in places. Also, because he seems to like almost nothing about the war we’re running on the war on terror, it’s hard to separate the “signal from the noise” and know how much stock to put in his ideas.

76) Popular Mechanics: Debunking 9/11 Myths: Why Conspiracy Theories Can’t Stand Up to the Facts (B: As you’d expect, it’s a bit dry and it can’t cover every cockeyed theory, but it very thoroughly debunked a lot of the more popular “Truther” nonsense that you’ve probably heard about 9/11)

75) James Bowman: Honor: A History (A: A very well done book that helps explain our own culture’s history with honor and that of other nations. This book does an outstanding job of explaining behavior that at times, appears downright mysterious to people not steeped in a culture of honor.)

74) George Washington: George Washington’s Rules of Civility & Decent Behavior in Company and Conversation (D-: The book is, not unexpectedly, very out of date at this point. However, it’s really too short to even be a book. It’s more like an essay.)

73) Allan Bloom: The Closing of the American Mind (C-: This is supposed to be a conservative classic and it does have an exceptional start, but it quickly becomes very tedious, spends far too much time on philosophy, and comes across as mere crabby complaining in many places.)

72) Angela McGlowan: Bamboozled: How Americans are being Exploited by the Lies of the Liberal Agenda (A: This is a fantastic book that covers how the Democratic party has Bamboozled black Americans into voting for them despite the fact that the Democrats do little for black Americans and have been a traditionally racist party.)

71) Shaunti and Jeff Feldhahn: For Men Only: A Straightforward Guide to the Inner Lives of Women (B: There were some interesting insights into the female mind in this book.)

70) H.W. Crocker: Don’t Tread on Me: A 400-Year History of America at War, from Indian Fighting to Terrorist Hunting (B+: The book is a bit too concise in places, which is sort of a given in a 464 page book that covers all of America’s wars, but it is extremely well written. I liked Crocker just a shade less than my two favorite historical writers, Robert Leckie and Victor Davis Hanson.

69) Frank J. Fleming & Sarah C. Fleming: The Chronicles of Dubya Volume 1: The Defeat of Saddam (B: This is a book based on IMAO’s “In My World” series. It was extremely funny and well put together, but because I was already a fan, I’ve read a lot of the material in the book already on IMAO’s blog. That’s why it got a “B” rating. On the other hand, if you haven’t read a lot of the series on IMAO and are looking for something funny to peruse, I’d highly recommend this book.)

68) Greg Bear: Blood Music (C: The first 3/4 of the book was really exceptional, but Bear went all M. Night Shyamalan at the end and ruined what was shaping up to be an extraordinary work of science fiction with plot twists too bizarre to be taken seriously.)

67) John Leppelman: Blood on the Risers: An Airborne Soldier’s Thirty-five Months in Vietnam (A: A magnificent, first person account of the fighting, misery, and incompetent officers that ordinary soldiers had to endure in Vietnam.)

66) C. S. Lewis: Mere Christianity (B: The first 3/4 of the book was simply brilliant, but the book bogs down a lot at the end when Lewis goes from explaining Christianity simply, in an easy to understand way, and gets deep into theology.)

65) John Lewis Gaddis: The Cold War: A New History (B-: The book was supposed to be a concise history of the Cold War and it was – perhaps too much so. It’s probably a good summary for people who aren’t familiar with the Long, Twilight Struggle, but it also seemed like a lot of key episodes weren’t covered as well as they should be.)

64) William Easterly: The White Man’s Burden: Why the West’s Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good (D+: The book had a few nuggets of interest in it, but was dry and quite frankly, didn’t say much that couldn’t have been said just as well in a 5000 word essay.)

63) Eric Bischoff & Jeremy Roberts: Controversy Creates Cash (B+: You won’t like this book unless you like wrestling, but if you do, it’s a good read about the fall of WCW.)

62) Dick Wirthlin and Wynton C. Hall: The Greatest Communicator: What Ronald Reagan Taught Me About Politics, Leadership, and Life (A-: A superb book with lots of stories about Reagan and what people can learn from him.)

61) Frank Miller: 300 (A+: Shorter than I expected, but an exceptional read. The book was every bit as good as the movie (edited)!)

60) Robert Leckie: “A Few Acres of Snow”: The Saga of the French and Indian Wars (A: This is a typical Leckie book. In other words, it’s superbly written and covers what happened in great detail although fortunately, this one was a little shorter than many of his other books.)

59) Dwight Eisenhower: In Review, Pictures I’ve Kept (B: It was fascinating to read about WW2 and Eisenhower’s time in the White House and little details jumped out at you. The UN seemed to actually function back then. Eisenhower said he had opposed using nukes against Japan, but let it be known that he was willing to use nuclear weapons against China if there was a conflict. It’s a good historical perspective.)

58) Scott Williams: Hardcore History: The Extremely Unauthorized Story of the ECW (B: I can’t fully explain why I read this book so soon after reading the other except that perhaps I thought it might have some better stories. It did – a little better anyway, although it covered a lot of the same ground.)

57) Tony Robbins (Reread): Awaken the Giant Within : How to Take Immediate Control of Your Mental, Emotional, Physical and Financial Destiny! (A+: This is one of my favorite books of all-time and it was nice to read it for a 3rd (or is it a 4th?) time.)

56) Thom Loverro: The Rise & Fall of ECW: Extreme Championship Wrestling(C+: Not a terrible book, but I had heard a lot of this before.)

55) Victor Davis Hanson: Why the West Has Won (A-: VDH describes how and why some of the greatest Western military victories – and defeats – took place.)

54) Maddox: The Alphabet Of Manliness (C: Maddox is about the funniest writer you’ll ever run across on the net, but the book is really uneven. Some chapters (where Maddox sticks to what he does better than anyone else, biting sarcasm) are laugh out loud funny and others are very ho-hum.)

53) David Maraniss: When Pride Still Mattered: A Life Of Vince Lombardi (B: This was a well written and detailed book about Lombardi, but I may not be enough of a football fan these days to fully appreciate it.)

52) R.A. Salvatore: The Two Swords (Forgotten Realms: The Hunter’s Blades Trilogy, Book 3) (C: Not Salvatore’s best work and inexplicably, he doesn’t wrap things up in the the third and presumably final book of the trilogy. Most unsatisfying.)

51) R.A. Salvatore: The Lone Drow (Forgotten Realms: The Hunter’s Blades Trilogy, Book 2) (B-: Salvatore’s heart doesn’t seem to be in this series.)

50) R.A. Salvatore: The Thousand Orcs (Forgotten Realms: The Hunter’s Blades Trilogy, Book 1) (B: Great characters, but the dialogue seems a little stilted at times.)

49) Donald Kagan: The Peloponnesian War (A: As you read about this epic 25 year long war between Greek States that happened 2500 years ago, you will, believe it or not, see parallels very applicable to the war on terror pop-up.)

48) Robert B. Cialdini: Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion (B: Lots of info on how sales techniques play upon particular human tendencies.)

47) Desmond Stewart: Early Islam (Great Ages of Man) (B+: It was interesting to read a book about Islam that was done pre-9/11. Lots of details about Muhammad and the power struggles after his death)

46) Roger L. Depue, Susan Schindehette: Between Good and Evil: A Master Profiler’s Hunt for Society’s Most Violent Predators (B: If he had spent the whole time talking about his career at the FBI instead of his personal life, this probably would have been an A)

45) Ann Coulter: Godless: The Church of Liberalism (A: another great, great read from Ann. See the interview here and the quotes here.)

44) Fletcher Pratt: The Battles That Changed History (B: This was a good read overall and Pratt is a skilled writer, but a little more detail at times would have been helpful)

43) Joe Klein: Politics Lost: How American Democracy Was Trivialized By People Who Think You’re Stupid (B-: Klein is a liberal and I didn’t agree with everything he said, but the book was a quick, fun read with lots of “inside baseball” nuggets of interest tossed out to political junkies. See the quoteshere.)

42) Henry Hazlitt: Economics in One Lesson: The Shortest and Surest Way to Understand Basic Economics (C: I know this is supposed to be a classic, but it seemed a little too dated for my taste)

41) Mona Charen: Do-Gooders: How Liberals Hurt Those They Claim to Help (and the Rest of Us) (B+: Read it, enjoyed it, and created a batch of quotes.)

40) Roy Hazelwood & Stephen Michaud: Dark Dreams: Sexual Violence, Homicide and the Criminal Mind (B: If you enjoyed abnormal psych in college or are interested in profiling, this is a capitivating, albeit disturbing, book)

39) Claire Berlinski: Menace in Europe: Why the Continent’s Crisis Is America’s, Too (B: Her style, which involves taking personal stories and weaving them into broad narratives works extremely well in most cases, but not so well in others. Still, this was a thought provoking book that showcased some seldom discussed, but very relevant ideas about Europe)

38) Edwin Feulner & Doug Wilson: Getting America Right: The True Conservative Values Our Nation Needs Today (B: This is chock full of good ideas and interesting factoids.)

37) Tom Bethell: The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science (D: This book has a lot of fascinating information in it, but some of the chapters, for example on cancer and aids in Africa, struck me as a bit flakey and “off.” That left me unsure of how much of the book to trust.)

36) Larry Elder: The Ten Things You Can’t Say In America (A-: If it wasn’t for the chapter advocating legalizing drugs, this would qualify as a conservative masterpiece.)

35) Barry Goldwater: The Conscience of a Conservative (C+: I didn’t agree with some of Goldwater’s views on race issues and the book feels a bit dated, perhaps because so many of his ideas have already been adopted and talked to death by conservatives and libertarians, but it was readable.)

34) Charles Pickering: Supreme Chaos: The Politics of Judicial Confirmation & the Culture War (B-: Pickering is magnificent, as good as you’re going to come across, when it comes to putting contentious issues that have come before the court into perspective for conservatives, but the book bogs down a bit when he talks about his own story.)

33) Ken Starr: First Among Equals: The Supreme Court In American Life (C-: Extremely informative, but also dry as dust. I’m not even sure this book is intended for a layman.)

32) Stuart Bell, Stan Campbell, James S. Bell: The Complete Idiot’s Guide to the Bible (A+: Very well written, very informative, easy to read through, and great reading. Highly recommended, especially if you want to learn more about the Bible, but are intimidated by the length and all the, “who begat who’s.”)

31) Rush Limbaugh: The Way Things Ought to Be (A – Reread: This is one of the conservative classics. It’s still a great read, although it feels a bit dated since it discusses a number of current events and it’s more than a decade old.)

30) Robert Leckie: Story of World War I (B+: I bought this one sight unseen so I didn’t realize it was for young adults and therefore shorter than the normal Leckie book. Still, it was an excellent overview of WW1. Probably the equivalent of reading one of those World War 1 for dummies books, except better written)

29) Peter Schweizer: Do As I Say (Not As I Do): Profiles in Liberal Hypocrisy (A: Lots of entertaining dirt on the hypocritical left. Full review here.)

28) Dean Koontz: Frankenstein, Book One: Prodigal Son (B: This was obviously meant to be the first part of a trilogy or a series which in part, alleviated my dismay at the fact that there wasn’t all that much Frankenstein in this book about Frankenstein.)

27) Tammy Bruce: The New American Revolution: Using the Power of the Individual to Save Our Nation from Extremists (B: A good read. Bruce reminds me of David Horowitz in some places. No one loathes the left like a convert to the right who has the scales ripped from his/her eyes.)

26) Victor Davis Hanson: Wars of the Ancient Greeks (D: This is by far the worst thing I’ve ever read by Hanson, perhaps because it was part of a Smithsonian series and they put too many restrictions on him.)

25) Jenna Jameson: How to Make Love Like a Porn Star: A Cautionary Tale (B: I thought reading a book by the world’s most famous porn star would be a nice change of pace — and it was, although it got a little dull in the middle when she killed time by talking about her childhood. Also, while — as you’d expect — this is a very racy book, it really is a cautionary tale.)

24) Noam Chomsky: Imperial Ambitions: Conversations on the Post-9/11 World (F: Don’t waste your time with this garbage. Full review here.)

23) Katherine DeBrecht: Help! Mom! There Are Liberals Under My Bed! (A for kids: I had a media copy of this one sent to me since it got so much attention. I thought it was an excellent children’s book with a great message and some very funny illustrations.)

22) Tommy Franks: American Soldier (C: Lots of interesting tidbits — for example, the guys at the Pentagon think Douglas Feith is a clown — but very, very dry in some places.)

21) Robert Leckie: Delivered from Evil: The Saga of World War II (A: Typical Leckie. Very long with lots of detail, but so well written it keeps you interested.)

20) Ric Flair: To Be the Man (A+: The best wrestling book ever, even better than Mick Foley’s, “Have a Nice Day!.”)

19) Roger Ailes: You Are the Message (A: This is a reread, but it’s always good to brush up on your communications skills)

18) Ann Coulter: High Crimes and Misdemeanors: The Case Against Bill Clinton (B: Lot of good info on the scandals in the Clinton administration, but it’s a little dry and incessant lobbying for impeachment feels a bit dated at this point)

17) Michelle Malkin: Unhinged: Exposing Liberals Gone Wild (A-: I proofed this book when it was months away from being published and I thought Michelle did a great job of cataloguing how loony the left has gotten.)

16) Robert Leckie: The World Turned Upside Down the Story of the American Revolution (A: You’ll learn more about the American Revolution by reading Leckie than any history class you’ll ever take)

15) John Douglas & Mark Olshaker: The Anatomy of Motive: The FBI’s Legendary Mindhunter Explores the Key to Understanding and Catching Violent Criminals (B: It’s a good read and if you enjoyed other books by Douglas or on profiling, you’ll probably like this one, too)

14) Brian Anderson: Southpark Republicans (B: This is a good intro to the blogosphere, Southpark Republicans, and the “new face of conservatism.”)

13) Steven Pressfield: The Virtues Of War (A-: Not as good a piece of historical fiction as, “Gates of Fire,” but what is? This was still a great read)

12) Milton & Rose Friedman: Free To Choose (B+: Good book, but I still think Sowell is better at breaking down economics issues)

11) Robert Leckie: Conflict: The History of the Korean War, 1950-53 (A: Only VDH is better at making history come alive than Leckie)

10) Mark Dubbin: Shadow Patriot (C-: Great concept, but the execution was a little flat.)

9) Thomas Sowell: Applied Economics: Thinking Beyond Stage One (B: Good stuff, but I liked Basic Economics better)

8) Ann Coulter: How to Talk to a Liberal (If You Must): The World According to Ann Coulter (B-: If you’ve regularly read Ann’s columns for the last few years. A- if you haven’t)

7) Paul Cartledge: The Spartans: The World of the Warrior-Heroes of Ancient Greece, from Utopia to Crisis and Collapse (C: Good information, but very dry reading and poorly organized)

6) Steven Pressfield: Gates of Fire: An Epic Novel of the Battle of Thermopylae (A+: Incredible read, loved it, loved it, loved it)

5) Ed Rollins: Bare Knuckles and Back Rooms : My Life in American Politics (B: Great for political junkies)

4) Dick Morris: Power Plays: Win or Lose — How History’s Great Political Leaders Play the Game (A-: Great for political junkies)

3) P.J. O’Rourke: Peace Kills: America’s Fun New Imperialism (B-: Readable, but not’s P.J.’s best work)

2) Joe Scarborough: Rome Wasn’t Burnt in a Day : The Real Deal on How Politicians, Bureaucrats, and Other Washington Barbarians are Bankrupting America (A-: The real deal on how Congress wastes your money)

1) Scott Keith: Wrestling’s One Ring Circus: The Death of the World Wrestling Federation (A for wrestling fans)**

 

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