As part of a never-ending series, I like to do short reviews of the books I read. Here are the latest 10 books I’ve read with the previous 170 that I’ve perused linked at the end of the post.

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 tomes 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.

Currently Reading: Jeffrey VanVonderen: Tired of Trying to Measure Up: Getting Free from the Demands, Expectations, and Intimidation of Well-Meaning People (I’m reading this because I’ve seen the author on Intervention, found him to be extremely impressive, and I want to learn more about his philosophy and way of thinking.)

10) 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.)

9) 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.)

8) 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.)

7) 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.)

6) 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.)

5) 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.)

4) 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.)

3) 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.)

2) 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.)

1) 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)

To see the previous 180 books I’ve read, click here.

From last to first..

Currently Reading: R.A. Salvatore: The Lone Drow: The Hunter’s Blades Trilogy, Book II (The Hunter’s Blades Trilogy)

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 interview.)

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 quotes here.)

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.)

You can see the previous 40 books I’ve read